
Book >Ot'^sXx7 



A HISTORY OF 
THE PERSE SCHOOL, CAMBRIDGE 



PUBLISHERS. 




CAMBRIDGE. 



LONDON: MACMILLAN &= CO., LIMITED 
GLASGOW: MACLEHOSE, JACKSON S' CO. 




TOMB OF THE FOUNDER, DR. STEPHEN PERSE, IN THE CHAPEL OF 
GONVILLE AND CAIUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE 



A HISTORY OF 

THE PERSE SCHOOL 
CAMBRIDGE 



J* M.-^' GRAY, B.A. 



KING S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE 



WITH SEVEN ILLUSTRATIONS 



CAMBRIDGE 

BOWES & BOWES 

1921 



vV 



(^ 



3 









COPYRIGHT 



PUBLISHERS' NOTE 

As the author has been unable, owing to absence 
from England, to see the book through the press, 
this work has been kindly undertaken by the Master 
of Jesus College and Mr. E. M. W. Tillyard, M.A., 
to whom our thanks are due. 

We also wish to express our gratitude for the 
kind loan of pictures, from which the illustrations 
were taken, to the following : the Headmaster 
(Dr. W. H. D. Rouse), the Syndics of the Cambridge 
University Press, the Master and Fellows of 
Gonville and Caius College, the Proprietors of the 
Illustrated London News, R. Parker Smith, Esq., 
Mr. W. F. Turner, and Messrs. Rattee & Kett. 

BOWES & BOWES. 
August y 1 92 1 . 



PREFACE 

I WISH to thank Dr. J. Venn, President of Gonville 
and Caius College, for giving me access to the 
college records and for imparting to me the valuable 
results of some of his own researches. I am 
indebted to the late Dr. Peile, Master of Christ's 
College, for useful information, both of his own 
and from the records of his college. My thanks 
are also due to the following for allowing me to look 
at college registers : Rev. T. A. Walker, LL.D. 
(Peterhouse) ; Mr. W. W. Rouse Ball, M.A. 
(Trinity) ; Mr. J. H. Sleeman, M.A. (Sidney, 
Sussex) ; the late Dr. S. A. Donaldson (Magdalene) ; 
Mr. D. L. Harris, M.A. (Downing). 

I have made frequent use in the following pages 
of Cooper's Memorials and Annals of Cambridge. 

J. M. GRAY. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER I PAGE 

Stephen Perse i 

CHAPTER H 

The Early Days of the Perse. (1618-36) - - - 22 

CHAPTER HI 
The Civil War Period. (1636-52) 40 

CHAPTER IV 

The Commonwealth and Restoration Period. (1652-87) 54 

CHAPTER V 
Decline and Fall. (1687- 1787) 70 

CHAPTER VI 

The Last Days of the Original Scheme. (1787-1841) - 87 

CHAPTER VII 

From one Reform Movement to another. (1833-73) - 106 

CHAPTER VIII 
The Last Fifty Years - - - - - - -139 

Index ------ 158 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Tomb of the Founder, Dr. Stephen Perse - Frontispiece 

(From Venn's Biographical History of Gonville and Caius 
College) 

FACING PAGE 

Old School in Free School Lane, circa 1840 (Exterior) 24 
(From Le Keux's Memorials of Cambridge) 

Old School in Free School Lane, 1845 (Interior) - 48 
(From The Illustrated London News) 

" Perse School Christmas Annual," 1874 - - - 66 

The School Hall, circa 1902 82 

The Perse Players, in 'The Death of Roland,' 1921 - 118 

The School War Memorial 156 



CHAPTER I 

STEPHEN PERSE 

For a town of its size and importance, Cambridge 
was signally deficient in facilities for school educa- 
tion in the latter half of the sixteenth century. 
The population was recorded in 1587 as approxi- 
mately five thousand, exclusive of members of the 
University. At the same date, Bury St. Edmunds 
and Ely each had less than half that number of 
inhabitants. Yet each of these places had a free 
grammar school, which was thrown open to the 
sons of the inhabitants. Two small schools were 
attached to King's and Trinity Colleges, but were 
confined exclusively to the choristers on those 
foundations ; otherwise Cambridge possessed no 
endowed school.^ The wants of the town were 

^ In 1443 Henry VI. established a school in connection with 
King's College. Provision was made therein for a master and 
sixteen choristers. In its origin it was a song school and was not 
in any way intended to provide for local requirements in education. 
It was by the Founder's directions confined exclusively to choristers, 
who were often recruited from places beyond Cambridge and its 
immediate neighbourhood. At the end of her reign Queen Mary 

P.S. A 



2 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

inadequately met by a few private schools kept 
by members of the University. These schools were 
all short-lived. None of them were conducted on 
a scale sufficient to cope with the educational 
requirements of the town. 

Realising how backward Cambridge was in this 
respect, the Corporation, in 1576, appointed nine 
of their number as a committee ** to devise and put 
in wrytinge some good devise for the erecting of a 
grammer schoole within the said towne, and how 
ye charges of the same male be borne and raysed." 
Later in the same year, a further committee of 
eleven was appointed to " rate and assesse what 
somes every person shall paie towards ye charges 
thereof." Apparently the difficulties attendant 
on the levying of such a rate put an end to the 
discussion, for nothing further was heard of the 
proposal. 

As public enterprise had failed, the inhabitants 
of Cambridge were obliged to wait until a private 
benefactor should provide for their needs. The 
first step towards the endowment of a school was 
made by William Bridon, who had entered Clare 

made provision for a similar school at Trinity, which was to comprise 
a master and ten choristers. This also was primarily a song school. 
In 1570 the teaching of grammar in Cambridge University was 
prohibited by statute, except in the case of the choristers of these 
colleges. 



STEPHEN PERSE 3 

Hall in the same year as the Corporation had put 
forward their proposal. Bridon was apparently a 
man of considerable means. After taking his 
degree, he married and settled in Cambridge. He 
died in or about 1590, and by his will bequeathed 
the sum of one hundred marks for the founding of 
a grammar school, or for some other work for the 
encouragement of learning. 

Unfortunately Bridon's gift was destined to lie 
useless for a quarter of a century. His bequest was 
deemed quite insufficient for the erection and endow- 
ment of a grammar school even when it was sup- 
plemented by another sum of one hundred marks. 
This second gift came from Thomas Cropley, who 
was also a member of Clare Hall, where he entered 
as a sizar in June, 1577. Cropley was evidently 
an intimate friend of Bridon, for in his will Bridon 
gives a legacy to one of Cropley's daughters. By 
his marriage with Anne, sister of Clement Hodson, 
alderman of Cambridge, Cropley was brought into 
contact with many of the leading townspeople. 
From them he came to realise what were the educa- 
tional deficiencies of Cambridge. By his will 
(dated November 24th, 1607), he added another 
hundred marks to Bridon's, hoping that the work 
so long delayed might at last be carried out. Never- 
theless his hope was not immediately realised. 



4 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

The money lay idle for eight years, for two hundred 
marks was considered no more adequate for the 
purpose than one hundred. 

Another graduate of the University, who took an 
interest in local affairs, was Stephen Perse, fellow of 
Caius College. He was senior to both Bridon and 
Cropley, for he had entered Caius in 1564. From 
the fact that he assumed the arms of the family it 
is to be presumed that he was connected with the 
Perses of Northwold, Norfolk. Of this family, 
the earliest known is a John Perse, who died in 1 505, 
leaving considerable bequests to Northwold. It 
was his son (also John) who, in 1560, received the 
grant of arms, which have since become associated 
with the Perse School.^ Stephen's father was also 
John, and was in all probability a grandson of the 
first John. This third John was originally of 
Great Massingham in Norfolk, but subsequently 
removed to Swaffham Market in the same county. 
Stephen Perse was born at Great Massingham in 
or about 1548. According to the Caius admission 
register Stephen's father was " mediocris fortunae," 
that is to say probably of the rank of a superior 
yeoman farmer. He had one other son. He was 

^ Sable, a chevron ermine, between three cockatrice's heads erased 
argent, lingued gules : and Crest, on a torse argent and sable, a 
pelican or vulning herself proper. Motto : Qui facit per alium facit 
per se. 



STEPHEN PERSE 5 

sufficiently wealthy to put his boys to school at 
Norwich, and to send Stephen to Cambridge as a 
pensioner. 

Of the undergraduate days of Stephen Perse we 
know nothing. He took his B.A. degree in 1569. 
His name appears last on the Ordo for that year, 
but as this list can in no way be said to be a true 
order of merit, and as two years later Perse was 
elected to a fellowship at his college, there is no 
reason for believing that his academic attainments 
were mediocre. ' Two examples of his classical work 
survive. One appears in a collection of Latin 
verses published by the University in 1603, in 
commemoration of the accession of James I. The 
contribution made by Perse is an ode of welcome 
to the new king. Like most of the other pieces in 
the collection, it is faultless both in its Latinity and 
its versification : otherwise the verses possess no 
remarkable merit, and are inclined to be bombastic. 
The other set of verses penned by Perse are to be 
found on the monument erected to his memory in 
Caius College Chapel.^ The most that can be said 
of these pieces is that they are typical of the period, 
being neither below nor above the average. The 

* Cp. p. 21. A set of verses, which bear a strong resemblance 
to the other known works of Perse, appears on the mural monument 
erected in St. Edward's Church, Cambridge, to the memory of his 
brother-in-law, William Becke. 



6 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

" six mapps," mentioned in an inventory of his 
goods which was compiled after his death, perhaps 
indicate a taste for geography. But Perse was 
clearly not a bookish man, for the same document 
informs us that his library was appraised at less 
than one half the value of his wearing apparel. 

At this period most of the fellowships at Caius 
College were allotted to the study of Theology or 
Law, but Dr. Caius had recently added to the 
foundation two fellowships attached to the study of 
Medicine. On his election, Stephen Perse " sett 
downe his profession in divinity." On May 7th, 
1573, he was ordained both priest and deacon by 
the Bishop of Peterborough, but does not appear to 
have ever held any ecclesiastical preferment. 
Shortly after his ordination, he ** was permitted and 
furthered " by Dr. Legge, then Master of Caius, 
*' to chaunge both his sayd profession and his 
place to another fellowshipp, whereby he professed 
physick." Within a very short period he again 
returned to the study of divinity. Finally, in 1 58 1, 
he took the degree of Doctor of Medicine and was 
permitted by Legge " to professe physick in the 
same place which he last desired, and by consent 
was graunted, for a divine." ^ 

^ Heywood and Wright, Cambridge University Transactions during 
the Puritan Controversies, i. 325, 330. 



STEPHEN PERSE 7 

All these changes had been sanctioned by the 
Master of the College but not by the Fellows, who 
complained that the last transaction was ** to ther 
mislikinge." The Fellows were at variance with 
Legge in other matters. In 1581 they petitioned 
the Chancellor of the University concerning their 
grievances. The preferential treatment accorded 
to Perse forms one of their charges against the 
Master, but nothing further is heard of this par- 
ticular complaint. Perse was allowed to retain his 
fellowship, and to devote himself to the study of 
medicine. The animosity against him died out, 
and in time he came to be on the best of terms with 
the other Fellows of his college. He proved him- 
self a competent man of affairs, and from 1579 to 
1593 acted as college bursar. In 1589 he was 
chosen to represent the faculty of medicine on the 
Caput — the executive council of the University. 

The interests of Stephen Perse were not confined 
to Caius College. After 1581, he came in contact 
with people outside the University. Prior to that 
date he had, in accordance with the usual custom, 
taken pupils. After obtaining his degree in 
medicine he abandoned the greater part of his 
tutorial work and practised as a physician in the 
town. For this new sphere he had an able rival in 
William Butler of Clare Hall, the physician of 



8 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

James I. and friend of Nicholas Ferrar. Butler 
was perhaps the most renowned English physician 
of his age, but " he was a man of great moodes." 
Some of his cures were effected in an alarming 
manner, and the uncertainty of his temper must 
have deterred many a patient from resorting to him.^ 
Conventional methods would be more popular than 
the extraordinary treatment which people were liable 
to suffer at Butler's hands. Patients would, therefore, 
prefer Perse to his more brilliant contemporary, 
who " would suffer persons of quality to wayte 
sometimes some houres at his dore, with coaches, 
before he would receive them." There was, how- 
ever, no professional jealousy between the two, for 
Perse made a bequest to Butler ** to make him a 
ringe in token of my especiall love to him." Perse 
was also on good terms with another local physician, 
Isaac Barrow. Perhaps Perse succeeded to Barrow's 
practice, for James, " sometymes servant to Dor 
Barroe," subsequently entered the service of the 
former as surgeon. Perse was godfather to Barrow's 
son, Isaac, the future Bishop of St. Asaph. 

Late in life Stephen Perse married. No definite 
date can be assigned for this marriage and the 
christian name of the lady is not known. She was 

^ In Cooper, Annals of Cambridge, iii. 119-124, will be found 
some account of Butler's eccentricities. 



STEPHEN PERSE 9 

the daughter of Simon Ellvin, of Heveningham 
Park, near Norwich, attorney-at-law. Her mother, 
her sister Eleanor, and her brother Thomas, who 
was about thirteen years of age when his brother-in- 
law deceased, are all mentioned in Stephen's will. 
As Perse makes no mention of his wife in his will, 
it must be concluded that she died before 161 5. 
His mother-in-law is mentioned there in terms of 
the deepest possible affection. Stephen's memories 
of his married days must therefore have been happy. 
Although in his latter days he was left a widower 
and childless, Stephen Perse was not without kins- 
folk in the town of Cambridge. , Mrs. Ellvin 
resided with her son Thomas in St. Edward's 
parish. At Trinity there was another Stephen 
Perse, who became a divine and fellow of his college. 
Yet another kinsman was Martin Perse, the head of 
the Northwold branch of the family, who came to 
reside in Cambridge in the early years of the seven- 
teenth century, and concerning whom this book will 
have more to say. On the death of his brother, 
John of Swaffham Market, Dr. Perse became the 
guardian of his niece Katherine,^ who also settled in 
Cambridge. In 1604 Katherine Perse married 
William Becke, a barrister of the Middle Temple, 
who had formerly been her uncle's pupil at Caius. 

^ Ely Episcopal Records, p. 254. 



lo HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

The Beckes resided in Luthburne Lane in the 
refectory of the Augustinian Friars. In 1615 they 
had a family of four sons and several daughters. 

Thirty years of practice as a physician enabled 
Stephen Perse to amass a considerable fortune — 
** ultra communem Academicorum sortem," as the 
writer of the Annals of Caius College somewhat 
enviously comments. With his savings he pur- 
chased the old refectory and close of the Augustinian 
Friars at Cambridge, where his brother-in-law 
resided. He was the owner of other property in 
Cambridge, as well as freehold and copyhold lands 
at Impington and Cottenham in the county. 

But wealth was not all that his doctoring brought 
him. He found himself brought closely into touch 
with the townspeople of Cambridge. In the earlier 
days his college pupils had been friends or the sons 
of friends from Norfolk, and persons of some 
affluence : in his later days they were without 
exception boys of quite humble origin. Many of 
them were local boys. In some cases he gave them 
instruction to prepare them for the University. 
Bartholomew Church, for instance, was grounded 
by him in the principles of rhetoric and dialectics, 
before he was admitted at Caius in 1601. The 
relations between the tutor and his pupils were often 
very homely. Three of the very last of his pupils 



STEPHEN PERSE ii 

obtained special mention in his will. The kindli- 
ness, moreover, was not confined entirely to these 
boys. Perse struck up friendships with many of 
his neighbours in Cambridge, the great majority 
being people of a very humble class. ** James my 
surgeon," *' Henry Prist my barber," and Perse's 
two menservants are all remembered in their master's 
will. Other friends, whom Perse was careful not to 
forget, were evidently patients or people with whom 
his practice brought him in contact. He was 
obviously something more than a physician to many 
Cambridge famiHes, and after his death his kindliness 
must have been greatly missed in many homes. He 
did something more than distribute promiscuous 
doles to obtain a reputation for charity. He learnt 
to study, and by studying to understand, what were 
the real and lasting wants of the town. Having no 
family dependent on him, he was in a position to 
evolve a scheme devoting a considerable portion of 
his wealth to the fulfilment of those wants. 

Perse's will is dated September 27th, 161 5 — 
only three days before his death, but from its 
elaborateness and the minuteness of its details it is 
quite clear that it was not a disposition of his estate 
hurriedly conceived upon his death-bed It was a 
scheme over which much time and thought had been 
expended. He had two objects in view when he 



12 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

formulated his plans. In the first place, like so 
many Elizabethans, he took a great interest in the 
social problems of the day and had the desire for 
their solution close at heart. In the second place, 
he watched with dismay the dissensions between 
the Town and University, and hoped by the creation 
of a common interest to pave the way for reconcilia- 
tion. First of all, as a patriotic son, he made a 
special bequest to the poor of his birthplace and the 
neighbouring parish of Harpley. Then he pro- 
ceeded to map out his plan for the benefit of the 
Town and University. The central feature of the 
whole scheme was a free grammar school, and this 
was to be the connecting link between the two 
corporations. Perse did not, however, confine his 
plan solely to the erection of a school. One of his 
chief objects was to prevent — or at any rate to 
relieve — destitution as much as possible. Pre- 
vention could be effected primarily by training up 
children to habits of industry : hence a raison d'etre 
for the school. Poverty could be further mitigated 
by providing for the aged, who had merited peace 
and security after a life of industry. Perse, 
therefore, proposed to erect an almshouse adjoin- 
ing his school for six poor widows, preference 
being given to parishioners of St. Michael's and 
St. Edward's. 



STEPHEN PERSE 13 

The school, however, was to be something more 
than a piece of machinery in a general scheme of 
social reform. Perse hoped that its foundation 
might ultimately put an end to the bitter rivalry 
between Town and University, which he had 
witnessed throughout his life. It is unnecessary to 
go into details of the many conflicts between the 
two. Suffice it to say that in 1 6 1 5, the very year in 
which Perse died, the quarrel became acute, when 
the Town petitioned the Crown for a new Charter 
conferring an extension of their privileges and the 
University presented a counter petition alleging that 
the proposed extension would be an encroachment on 
their own rights. The bequest of Stephen Perse is 
in significant contrast to the bitter feeling displayed 
at the time by both parties. He was anxious to 
prepare the way for reconciliation at once, for one 
of his very first requests is that the three University 
esquire bedels will co-operate with his old friend, 
Isaac Barrow, and three aldermen of the town, 
mentioned by name, in order to carry out his scheme. 
He devises a certain portion of his property to the 
seven upon trust, to sell the same and expend the 
proceeds in carrying out the trusts of his will. 

Perse hoped to heal the breach by making the 
school essentially a Town school, and yet giving it 
a very direct connection with the University. With 



14 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

that object in view, he imitated the twin foundations 
set up by William of Wykeham and Henry VI. He 
did not need to create a college, for one was already 
at hand. At his own college of Caius he founded 
six scholarships and six fellowships, for election to 
which special preference was to be given to boys 
educated at his school. The scholars were each to 
receive f^\ -per annum and the fellows Ifi. They 
were all to be. housed in a special building which 
Perse directed to be built at a cost to his estate 
of is^o. 

Perse, furthermore, described in some detail the 
principles that were to regulate his school. The 
first governors were to be his three executors. 
These were Valentine Carey (then Master of Christ's 
and Dean of St. Paul's, afterwards Bishop of 
Exeter) ; his kinsman, Martin Perse ; and the 
Founder's solicitor, Robert Spicer, to whom Perse 
left a ring of the value of ;^3 " for ould remembrance 
of friendshippe." These three were to frame rules 
for the conduct of the school, which they were to 
submit to the Justices of Assize for revision or 
confirmation. The appointment of the masters and 
of the Perse scholars and fellows of Caius was to be 
in their hands. After the decease of the last sur- 
vivor of these three, the management of the school 
was to be entrusted to the master and four senior 



STEPHEN PERSE 15 

fellows of Caius. As remuneration for their services 
as governors the fellows were each to receive an 
annual stipend of thirty shillings : the Master was 
to be paid three pounds. The school itself was to 
be erected on *' all those garden grounds parcell of 
the Fryars,^ now in the occupacion of John Paske, 
William Smithson, and Benjamin Prime, or either 
of them, and also all that parcell of ground lying 
between the said gardens and the wallnut trees in 

Fryars close, and the garden grounds and 

tenements now Mr. Ward's, adjoyning upon the 
said gardens," — that is to say at the south end of 
the street which was then known as Luthburne 
Lane, leading from the present Benet Street to 
Pembroke Street. The almshouses already men- 
tioned were to be built within the circuit of the same 
grounds. 

On this site the executors were to erect ** a 
convenient house to be used for a Grammar Free 
Schoole, with one lodging chamber for the Master 
and another for the Usher." These two were to be 
graduates of Cambridge University. The Master 
was to be of the degree of Master of Arts at least, 
and to receive a stipend of forty pounds a year. 
The Usher was to have a salary of twenty pounds, 
and was expected to be a Bachelor of Arts at least. 

^ Sc. the Augustinian friars. 



1 6 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

The two were to teach gratuitously five score 
scholars born in Cambridge, Barnwell, Chesterton, 
or Trumpington, '* and no more, nor any other." 
This last injunction should be noted : this pro- 
vision was intended to prevent the school from 
being swamped with non-foundationers to the 
detriment of the foundationers — that is to say, to 
emphasise the fact that the school was primarily 
intended for the benefit of the Town. Any boy 
who had attended the school for at least three years 
was to be eligible for a Perse scholarship, and in the 
due course of events a Perse fellowship, at Caius. 
Furthermore, preference was to be given to boys 
formerly educated at the school in appointment to 
any vacancy in the posts of master or usher. 

All the foregoing regulations reveal the thorough- 
ness with which the Founder planned his scheme in 
his desire to avoid all ambiguity in the interpretation 
of his will. In face of this it is somewhat surprising 
to find how very unsatisfactory is his treatment of 
the financial side of the scheme. Perse instructed 
his executors to sell his property in St. Sepulchre's 
parish, known as the Horn, to provide the necessary 
capital for erecting the school buildings. The 
executors are also " to use their best means for 
obtaining of the two hundred marks heretofore 
devised by Mr. Thomas Cropley and Bridon " for 



STEPHEN PERSE 17 

furthering the same object. Perse desired to 
guarantee a permanent and non-fluctuating income 
to his charity. With this object in view he pro- 
posed to offer upon receipt of satisfactory security 
a sum of ;^2ooo to the corporation of Norwich, and 
a sum of ;^iooo to each of the corporations of 
Cambridge, Bury, and Lynn. These sums were 
to be regarded as loans, and the recipients were to 
pay interest at the rate of five per cent, annually 
into the funds of the trust. The corporations were 
not to be allowed to exercise their own discretion 
as to the investment of the money thus lent. Perse 
gave specific instructions as to the manner in which 
they were to obtain the required interest. The 
capital was to be lent out upon good security in sums 
not exceeding forty pounds to young tradesmen 
belonging to the four different towns at five per cent, 
interest and no more. The Founder thus calculated 
that the five thousand pounds capital would produce 
an income of £2^0^ which would be sufficient to 
meet the expenses of the trust. 

If the Norwich and the other three corporations 
accepted these terms, there was a perpetual guar- 
anteed income for Perse's trust. But would the 
four think the terms worth accepting ? Would 
they consent to become revenue collectors to the 
Perse trustees ? The Founder was short-sighted 



1 8 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

in that he did not see that the answer to these 
questions would most obviously be a decided 
negative. The bargain was a very one-sided one. 
The sole benefit the towns could hope to derive was 
the possibility of indirect improvement of trade by the 
encouragement of struggling beginners. Against 
this were to be set hard facts. The corporations 
were to receive no remuneration whatever for their 
services as collectors, and they were asked to meet all 
deficiencies out of their own pockets. As they were 
precluded from exacting anything more than five 
per cent. — at that time half the recognised legal 
rate of interest — they were asked to run very con- 
siderable risks. The bargain was not good enough, 
and accordingly each corporation renounced its 
legacy, when the terms of the will were made known. 
Apparently Perse in his lifetime received an 
intimation that his legacies might not be deemed 
altogether acceptable and he prepared for such a 
contingency. It is this alternative scheme which 
shows the most want of care. Perse added the 
following clause to his will : — 

" Provided alwayes and my minde is, that if any incon- 
venience be by my Executours and supervisours seen into 
that the saide ccl" per annum shall not be sufficiently 
assured, to continue in perpetuity by such assurances as 
may be taken from the said Corporations (which I desire 
may be for the good of many of the said corporations). 



STEPHEN PERSE 19 

then I will that the said d" so bequeathed as aforesaid 
to the said Corporations of Norwich, Cambridge, Burie, 
and Lin, or so much thereof as shall not be secured, be by 
my Executours .... bestowed and layde out in the pur- 
chase of lands to raise or make up the revenue of ccl" per 
annum ultra reprisas .... Soe alwayes as the yearly 
revenue thereof be yearely from time to time received, 
layd out, and paid, in such manner, to such uses, intents, 
and purposes, and to such persons as before in this my will 
is appointed to be paid in perpetuity." 

At first sight this insertion appears quite satis- 
factory, but in considering Perse's will it must be 
borne in mind that the testator always clung to the 
idea that the income of the trust would be a fixed 
one. Even when he sanctioned the investment of 
the capital in land, he still thought that the land 
would bring in a steady rental of {^1^0 — no less 
and no more. Not only did he consider that the 
income would be permanent ; he also carefully 
specified the precise amount which was to be paid 
to each individual object of his benefaction. In all 
these payments amount to ^{[243 14s. 8d., leaving a 
surplus of £6 5s. 4d. Perse thought that this 
surplus was always going to be six odd pounds, 
and no more. Accordingly, without the slightest 
possible hesitation, he directed that it should be 
" from time to time bestowed upon such charitable 
uses, as my Executours for their times, and after my 
supervisours, shall think fit." So long as this 



20 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

residue did not exceed six or seven pounds, this 
discretionary power was a matter of no great impor- 
tance ; but when this surplus began to increase — 
indeed eventually to exceed the amount ear-marked 
for the special objects of the will — it became an 
instrument with which unconscientious trustees 
might stultify the intentions of the testator. As 
will be seen on a later page, it was quite possible for 
an unscrupulous set of trustees to regard themselves 
as the deserving objects of Stephen Perse's charity 
and to leave the principal objects of his will to 
subsist on their bare statutable payments — pay- 
ments which were rendered all the more meagre by 
the decrease in their relative value as years went on. 
It was not until 1837 that this loophole for legal 
malversation was closed by order of a court of law. 
During the intervening two centuries the school was 
to suffer severely for the want of foresight with 
which the Founder expressed his wishes. 

It would, however, be unjust as well as ungrateful 
to blame the Founder for being unable to foresee 
the future. The clause empowering the trustees to 
invest in land is a hasty insertion made in all 
probability as Perse lay on his death-bed. For the 
moment the intimation, that the corpor^itions might 
renounce their legacies, looked as if it might bring 
the great scheme to an untimely end. But Perse was 



STEPHEN PERSE 21 

not the man to be easily frustrated. He endeavoured 
to adapt his plans to changed circumstances, but 
his alterations were hurriedly made and necessarily 
suffered from the imperfections of haste. 

The will bears date September 27th, 161 5. 
Three days later Stephen Perse passed away. He 
was buried in Caius College Chapel, where a large 
mural monument was erected to his memory by his 
relations. He is there represented in effigy kneeling 
in his doctor's robes. Above him are his crest and 
coat of arms, now familiar as the armorial bearings 
of the school. Below are the following lines com- 
posed by Perse himself : — 

Praenomen Stephanus, cognomen Perse vocatum, 

Sola Deo soli vita corona fuit. 
Cum vivente Deo remanet mihi vita perennis, 

Jamque cano soli iravrore So^o Oew. 
Haec moriens cecini lecturo Perseus ipse : 

Non uUi melius quam mihi notus eram. 

Christin, surnamed, Stephen Perse I hight, 
Sole life with God alone, my crowne my light, 

With living God eternall hfe I live. 

This now my song : to sole God praise I give, 
This Epitaph by me Perse was devized, 
To none else my thoughts better were comprised. 

In the town of Cambridge was destined to rise a 
greater monument still- — a monument which 
fittingly commemorates a life which, though quiet 
and uneventful, was well and nobly spent. 



CHAPTER II 

THE EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE. (1618-36) 

Two of Perse's executors, Carey and Spicer, very 
soon relieved themselves of their duties. By an 
indenture dated November 17, 161 5, they confided 
the sole execution of the will to the third executor, 
Martin Perse. Such an arrangement was not 
unnatural. Although residence was expected of 
him as Master of Christ's, Carey was frequently 
absent from Cambridge. As Bishop of Exeter and 
Dean of St. Paul's he had a good many other irons 
in the fire. Spicer was advanced in years. He 
acted as Registrary to the Perse trust to the day of 
his death, but the prospect of setting the Founder's 
scheme in good order could not have been inviting 
to a man of his age. Accordingly the sole respon- 
sibility devolved upon Martin Perse, who, from his 
intimate association with Stephen during his latter 
days, was eminently fitted to carry out the trust 
according to the spirit as well as the letter of the 
will. 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 23 

The Founder's fear that the corporations would 
not accept the proffered loans proved by no means 
unfounded. All four renounced their legacies, and 
the executor had to look about for land in which to 
invest the trust capital. In 1617 he purchased the 
manor of Frating and other adjoining properties in 
Essex. Next year he conveyed this purchase to the 
then master and four senior fellows of Caius upon 
the trusts of the will. Apparently not all the avail- 
able capital was invested in this estate, and the rental 
fell short of the required two hundred and fifty 
pounds by {jii is. od. For several years the 
residue remained uninvested and the deficiency in 
income was made up by an annual payment from 
Martin Perse. In 1627 the transaction was placed 
upon a permanent and more satisfactory basis. In 
consideration of the grant to him of liberty to cut 
the woods and underwoods of Frating, Perse con- 
veyed to Caius seventy-seven acres of arable 
land at Bassingbourne in Cambridgeshire. 

By the beginning of 161 7, Martin Perse found 
himself in a position to take steps for the erection of 
the grammar school and almshouses. All outstand- 
ing leases had been bought in, and the property 
rounded off by the purchase of the adjoining land. 
The Horn was sold, but it is not clear whether the 
two hundred marks bequeathed by Bridon and 



24 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

Cropley were obtained. A sufficient sum of money 
was, however, forthcoming for building purposes. 
The foundations were laid in February, 1617.^ 
By Michaelmas, 161 8, the building was ready for 
the reception of masters and boys. It lay at the 
south end of what was then known as Luthburne 
Lane, but subsequently changed its title to Free 
School Lane. To the south of it and facing the 
King's Ditch lay the " six severall low tenements " 
built for the almswomen. At the north end of the 
Friars' Close and just opposite St. Benet's Church 
there still stood the old refectory of the Augustinian 
Friars. The Founder had bequeathed this house to 
his niece, Katherine Becke, whose husband had died 
in 1 6 14. Shortly after Stephen's death she married 
Martin Perse, and the two resided in the house until 
1632, watching the little seedling planted by their 
kinsman pass safely through the critical stages of 
these early days. Long after the house had passed 
into other hands its former connection with the 
family of the Founder's sister was perpetuated by 
the familiar Perse coat of arms carved ** over ye 
chimney-piece on ye wainscot " of the dining room 
and the arms of the Becke family in the " matted 
room." 2 

* Bowtell MS. vii. p. 2722. 

* Warren's Book (ed. A. W. W. Dale), pp. 123, 140. 




OLD SCHOOL IN FREE SCHOOL LANE (eXTERIOR), CIRCA 184O 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 25 

As the school buildings did not entirely cover the 
remainder of the site, there was an open space left 
on the north side. This was made into a garden 
which, in 162 1, was let on a fifty years' lease at an 
annual rent of forty shillings, the said rent to be 
expended on all necessary repairs to the school. 
The school itself stood between this garden and 
the almshouses. It consisted of three sides of a 
quadrangle facing the lane. In the centre was the 
schoolroom. Flanking it on either side were the 
houses of the Master and Usher. The entrance 
from the lane to this quadrangle was through a gate- 
way surmounted by the arms of Stephen Perse. 
Within the gateway was a small court some twenty 
yards square. Entrance to the schoolroom was 
obtained by two narrow passages passing through 
the houses of the respective masters. The room 
itself was sixty-four feet in length, twenty feet in 
width, and in height up to the cornices some sixteen 
feet. The whole was surmounted by a fine open 
roof. The room was lighted by mullioned windows 
filled with panes of thick diamond-shaped glass. 
Except for the roof, there was no attempt at 
decoration. 

The early Masters inhabited the house on the 
north side of the school, but at some period during 
the eighteenth century they changed their residence 



26 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

for that of the Usher. From an inventory of the 
fittings of the Master's house made in 1687 we can 
obtain some idea of what the interior was like. It 
had an upper floor as well as garrets just under the 
roof. Entrance was obtained by a door leading 
from the forecourt straight into the parlour. 
Directly opposite to this door was another leading 
out into the garden behind. Above this parlomr 
was the study. The kitchen, *' butteries," and 
pantry were all crowded on the ground floor. Out- 
side was a considerable garden flanking the school 
on the north and west sides. In it the Master had 
a summer house and — more important still from 
the domestic point of view — a well and pump. 

The Usher's house was probably more or less a 
replica of that of the Master. Apparently it was 
not so large, for in 1664 the Usher paid tax for only 
two chimneys as against the Master's four. The 
Usher was not so fortunate as to possess a garden, 
unless he shared that of the Master. 

Such then were the buildings which were to be 
the home of the Perse for nearly two centuries. At 
Michaelmas, 161 8, the Master and Usher were 
appointed and the first boys admitted. It was not 
until 1624 that the Perse Account Books begin to 
record the names of the two Masters. Thomas 
Lovering is the first Master mentioned in these 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 27 

books, but from various college admission registers 
we learn that he was appointed four or five years 
before 1624. He was obviously the man for the 
executors of Stephen Perse to appoint. About 
1 6 14, Thomas Ellvin, the Founder's young brother- 
in-law, went to a school kept by the future 
Master of the Perse in St. Edward's Church. 
Stephen Perse must, therefore, have known and 
appreciated Lovering's undoubted teaching ability. 
Graduating from Pembroke Hall in 161 5, Lovering 
was not long afterwards appointed headmaster of the 
King's College School, where he continued until his 
appointment to the Perse. Some of his verses — 
both English and Latin — are still extant,^ and 
exhibit a literary facility of a high level. Both as a 
teacher and pioneer he was well fitted to do the 
spade work required in a new school. No appoint- 
ment could have been more gratifying to Stephen 
Perse had he been alive. 

No permanent rules for the conduct of the school 
were made until 1622. Then both Carey and 
Spicer joined with Martin Perse to frame ordinances, 
which in compliance with Founder's directions were 

1 These are to be found in the following works : Ralph Winterton's 
Aphorismes of Hippocrates (1633), William Hawkins' Corolla Varia 
(1634), Lacrymae Cantabrigienses (1619), Cant. Dolor et Solamen 
(1625), and Epithalamium . . . Principum Caroli Regis et H. Mariae 
(1625). 



28 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

duly submitted to the two Justices of Assize for 
confirmation. From these rules much can be 
gleaned about the life of the early members of the 
Perse School. As the Founder had requested, free 
scholars' places were limited to one hundred boys 
from Cambridge, Barnwell, Chesterton, and Trum- 
pington. The executors did not, however, in 
further conformity with the instructions laid down 
in the will restrict the advantages of the school to 
free scholars only. Nevertheless, whilst throwing 
the Perse open to non-free scholars, they carefully 
took steps to prevent the headmaster from neglecting 
the free scholars for those who paid. They strictly 
forbad him to take in other than foundationers 
*' except the Master and Usher doe take to them 
such further sufficient help as the Executors think 
fit." 

The manner of admitting a free scholar seems 
remarkably simple to those who live in an age of 
competitive examinations. The candidate's parents 
appHed to the churchwarden of his native parish for 
a written statement that the boy was born or baptised 
in Cambridge or one of the three privileged villages.^ 
The father or mother brought this certificate to the 
executors (and after their deaths to the Master and 

^ Some sixty or seventy of these birth and baptismal certificates 
can still be seen in the Caius College Treasury. 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 29 

four senior fellows of Caius). If there was only one 
candidate in the field, the governors of the school 
would admit the boy at once on receipt of such a 
certificate. In the event of two or more applicants 
for a single vacancy, it was directed that ** a poor 
man's child shall be preferred to it before a rich, so 
that he makes suit for it in time." The parent of 
the successful candidate received from the governors 
a written order of admission, which he presented to 
the headmaster. Apparently the headmaster used 
sometimes to anticipate this order and receive the 
boy a week or a fortnight before the admission was 
formally granted.^ Upon entrance all new boys 
were required to pay twelvepence to the Usher *' in 
lieu of his pains for writing their names into the 
book and tables." 

These formalities once finished, the boy settled 
down to the routine of school life. He was an early 
riser, for he was expected to be in his place at the 
school by six o'clock in the morning. At half-past 
six the scholars assembled for prayers, after which 

^ Such appears to have been the case under a later Master, as can 
be gathered from the following extracts from Alderman Samuel 
Newton's diary for the year 1666-7 • " Feb: 12th. On Tewsday was 
the first time John Newton my sonne went to the Grammar Free 
Schoole in Cambridge — Feb: 26: Joh. Newton was entred by Dr 
Bradyes order into the Free Schoole. On Tewsday Do' Robt 
Brady Ma'' of Caijus Coll: gaue mee his order under his hand to 
Mr Griffith ma' of the said schoole for his receiving the said John 
Newton in the same schoole." 



30 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

ordinary lessons continued until eleven. The after- 
noon's work began at one and lasted until five, when 
the boys again came together for prayers before 
dispersing to their homes. 

The curriculum provided for teaching ** as well 
in good manners as in all other instruction and 
learning fit to be learned in a Grammar School." 
This general instruction would give the Master 
scope to employ what methods of teaching he liked. 
Latin would be the chief scholastic exercise, the 
thorough teaching of the Roman tongue being, as 
the name implies, the very purpose for which 
grammar schools were designed. On his arrival at 
the Perse, a boy would, therefore, be expected to be 
equipped with some knowledge of the rudiments 
acquired either at home or at a petty school. For 
instance, John Newton, who was admitted to the 
school in 1667, shortly before his eighth birthday, 
was able soon after his admission to write in his 
father's diary in a sprawling hand with the guidance 
of lines ruled in pencil. At the Perse almost the 
whole of the schoolboy's time would be devoted to 
the study of Latin. In his first year he would be 
fully occupied in learning the elements of Latin 
accidence, and would probably be expected to 
commit to memory lists of common words. In his 
second year, after fully mastering grammar, he 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 31 

would turn to an elementary phrase-book such as 
Sententiae Pueriles^ thereby becoming familiar with 
the structure and idioms of the language. In his 
third year conversational methods of teaching would 
be introduced, and one of the many manuals bearing 
the title of Conjahulationes Pueriles would be placed 
in his hands. The boys in the higher forms would 
read Ovid, ** Tully," and Virgil, and in the highest 
form of all would gain an insight into Latin drama. 
Seneca would be the most popular tragedian, and the 
plays of Terence and Plautus would also be read and 
perhaps acted. Greek would probably not be learnt 
until a boy had reached one of the higher forms. 
Boys at the top of the school might possibly begin to 
learn Hebrew. A boy who remained at the Perse for 
some five or six years would have a good colloquial 
knowledge of Latin. Towards the end of his 
school career the constant speaking of the language 
would be indispensable and the writing of Latin 
letters would be insisted upon. As the history of the 
Perse will show, the small Latin and less Greek 
taught in the ordinary seventeenth century grammar 
school awakened the latent powers of more than one 
schoolboy of humble origin and served a useful 
purpose in mental discipline. 

Little or no provision was made for other subjects 
which are now regarded as indispensable in secondary 



32 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

education. We hear nothing of the teaching of 
mathematics. Dead languages had priority over all 
other branches of learning. John Newton had to 
wait till his school days were over before he could 
learn '* the French language " and the gentle art of 
playing on the ** Base Viall." 

As a rule boys left at an earlier age than is usual 
nowadays. Those who did not intend to proceed 
to the University were generally apprenticed to 
some local tradesmen between the ages of twelve 
and fifteen. Other boys went up to college when 
they were between fourteen and seventeen years old. 
During the eighteen years of his headmastership, 
Lovering sent a large number of boys to the Uni- 
versity — probably a far larger number than came 
at that time from any other school of the same 
size. About one hundred of his former pupils can 
be traced as having entered different colleges at 
Cambridge, and of these fifteen became fellows of 
colleges. A certain number of these were attracted 
to Caius College by the prospect of obtaining a Perse 
scholarship and fellowship, but a large number 
entered at other colleges as pensioners, or, in the 
case of poorer boys, as sizars, who sometimes paid 
their college bills " in wares " in default of money.* 

^ An example of a former Perse boy paying his bill partly " in 
wares " is given in Peile's Biographical Register of Christ's College, 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 33 

A Perse boy, who had graduated at the University, 
had a special preference in selection for any vacancy 
in the post of Master or Usher. If we take into 
consideration the salaries usually paid to members 
of the teaching profession in the seventeenth century, 
both these posts were well paid. The Master 
received the forty pounds' stipend directed to be 
paid to him by the Founder. In further conformity 
with the will of Stephen Perse he was required to be 
of the standing of Master of Arts at least. The 
executors further ordained that he was not to hold 
any fellowship or ecclesiastical preferment in con- 
junction with his mastership under penalty of 
forfeiture of his post at the school. The ordinances 
did not require the Master to be in his place at the 
school before seven o'clock in the morning. They 
also allowed him to be absent during school time 
for not more than one hour during the day. 

The Usher was not permitted so much liberty as 
the Master. He had to be in attendance during 
the whole of school hours. His stipend was twenty 
pounds per annum, and he was required to be a 
Bachelor of Arts at least. Like the Master, he was 
not allowed to hold preferment outside the school. 

vol. i. p. 383. The first payment received from the father of Jeremy 
Goose, the boy in question, is " taken at his shop from his admission 
26 April 1627 to 16 August 1628 — 2" 8s 4d." The final bill is partly 
paid " in wares." 

p.s. c 



34 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

The Usher was also expected to undertake the duties 
of registrar. He was required to keep an admission 
book recording the names of all free scholars as they 
entered the school with the date and year of their 
election. As has been noticed already, he received 
twelvepence from each new scholar by way of 
remuneration. It was further directed that the 
Usher should ** from time to time bring the said 
book to the Executours during their lives, and after 
to the Supervisours, that the schollers so elected 
may also be written in the book remaining with 
the Executours or Supervisours, that they may 
both agree." This duplication was not enough 
for the executors. Their sixth ordinance decreed 
that there shall be a small handsome frame of board, 
with a paper pasted thereon, *' wherein all the free 
schollers names shall be from time to time written 
by the usher of the school, and as any of the schollers 
goes away, his name shall be crossed out, and the 
schollers name put in that is new chosen, and 
the time of his election. And once every year the 
table shall be renewed by taking off the old paper 
and putting on a new with all the free schollers 
names, written thereupon that then are remaining 
in their places, which Table shall continually hang 
up in the school, to that end that every one that 
cometh into the school may see whether the full 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 35 

number of free schollers be there from time to time 
taught according to Dr. Perse's Will." 

Had all these records been preserved the historian 
of the Perse would have had a plenteous store from 
which to gather materials for his work. Un- 
fortunately, the ushers little knew how precious 
were the documents entrusted to their care. Not a 
single complete register survives. Two loose pages 
from one book ^ are all that remain of what might 
have been an invaluable store of historical matter. 

There is no record in the Perse Accounts of any 
payment being made to any assistant master except 
the Usher. At one period, however, Lovering had 
a ** further sufficient help," as enjoined by the 
school ordinances, to assist in the teaching of non- 
foundationers. Presumably the Master paid this 
assistant out of his own pocket. Th6 assistant in 
question was a Mr. Burgis, who, about 1630, was 
appointed Master of Saffron Walden Grammar 
School. He was destined to regret his promotion, 
for divers inhabitants of Walden '* brought him to 
such infinite suits and charges, that, being now in 
holy orders, he is likely to be turned out into the 
wide world a-begging." ^ 

^ Now to be seen in the Caius College Treasury. 

* Calendar of State Papers (Domestic), ccxlvi. (letter dated Feb. 8. 
1636-7) and ccxlvii. (letter dated Feb. 1637). Mr. Burgis is appar- 
ently to be identified with. Peter Burgess, of St. John's College, 



36 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

Burgis went to Saffron Walden at the general 
request of the townspeople — a fact which testifies to 
the reputation enjoyed by Perse masters at this time. 
The fame of the school reached further than neigh- 
bouring counties. We find among Lovering's 
pupils boys from such distant places as Northumber- 
land and County Cork. Parents of exalted rank 
also entrusted their sons to Lovering's care. Talbot 
Pepys of Impington, Recorder of Cambridge, sent 
two of his sons to the school. ^ Sir William Beecher, 
Clerk to the Privy Council of James L, withdrew his 
son from Eton to place him under Lovering,^ and 
Lord Chaworth of Ardagh sent his second son to 
the school. As the school ordinances directed, the 
free scholars were most frequently drawn from the 
humbler walks in life. With all its deficiencies 
the seventeenth century grammar school was demo- 
cratic — a quality regrettably absent in many of its 
modern successors. 

Lovering was fortunate in having the ready co- 

Cambridge (M.A. 1630), who was ordained deacon (Peterborough) 
September 20, 1629, and licensed to practise medicine in 1634. 

1 Talbot was great-uncle of Samuel Pepys, the diarist. Roger 
and John Pepys, the two sons here referred to, are frequently 
mentioned in their cousin's diary. Roger Pepys was Recorder 
and Member of Parliament for Cambridge 1661-79. John Pepys 
was Fellow of Trinity Hall in 1641. 

2 The son, William Beecher, was Fellow of St. John's, Cambridge, 
1631-47- 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 37 

operation of those whom the founder had requested 
to carry out his will. Alderman Robert Lukin, one 
of the seven devisees for the sale of the Founder's 
property, sent his son James to the school. Still 
closer was the connection between the school and 
the near relations of the Founder, more especially 
Martin Perse. Two step-sons of Martin Perse, 
Perse Becke and William Becke, were among the 
first boys to be admitted to the school. Both of 
them proceeded to Caius, where they became Fellows 
on their great-uncle's foundation. At a later date 
Martin Perse sent his own sons, Valentine and 
Martin, to the school. They subsequently became 
scholars on the Perse foundation at Caius. ^ 

Martin Perse, the elder, did not allow his interest 
in the school to flag after he had finished the task of 
establishing it and setting the machinery in motion. 
Contemporary records show that he worked hard to 
promote better relations between the Town and 
University. He fully realised the valuable part the 
school could play in bringing this about. As a 
prominent citizen of Cambridge and as one who 
had twice filled the office of mayor and had been 

1 Martin Perse eventually became a Perse Fellow. He died in 
1646 and by his will bequeathed a legacy to the Perse almswomen. 
The last kinsman of the Founder to be connected with the school 
was Thomas, son of Thomas Elwin, brother-in-law of Stephen Perse, 
who was admitted as free scholar in 1641. 



38 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

sheriff of the county, he was in a position to interest 
influential people in the school. It is evident that 
Martin Perse performed his duties of trustee con- 
scientiously. During part of each year he resided 
at Prating to manage the trust estates. The 
remainder of the year was spent at his house in 
Cambridge, and his close interest in the school is 
revealed in the care with which he nominated the 
free scholars, and selected boys of real ability to fill 
the vacancies on the Perse foundation at Caius. 

Jeremy Taylor owed his nomination to a free 
scholar's place to Martin Perse. The future Bishop 
of Down and Connor was the son of a Cambridge 
barber, and baptised at Holy Trinity Church on 
August 15, 1613. He appears to have been one of 
the original free scholars, — in fact, he may have 
come with Lovering to the Perse from King's 
College School. He was, we are told, " ripe for 
the University afore custom would allow of his 
admittance." In 1626, when only thirteen years 
old, he proceeded to Caius, where he was on the 
nomination of Martin Perse elected a Perse Scholar. 
At the age of twenty he became a Fellow on the same 
foundation. As his biographer says, " he was a man 
before he was of age and knew little more of the state 
of childhood than its innocency and pleasantness." 

Taylor's connection with his old school did not 



EARLY DAYS OF THE PERSE 39 

end when he entered the University. After his 
election to a fellowship, he took pupils in accordance 
with the usual custom. Amongst these pupils were 
three Perse boys. One of these was a medical 
student named Edward Langsdale. There was a 
great sympathy between Taylor and this pupil, who 
was only six years his junior — a sympathy which 
ripened into life-long friendship. When, in 1635, 
Taylor was persuaded by Archbishop Laud to go 
to Oxford, Langsdale went with him. Four years 
later the tie between the two was made closer still 
by Taylor's marriage to Phoebe Langsdale, his 
pupil's sister. 

In the case of another of his pupils, Taylor was 
able to repay a debt to a family to whom he owed 
much, for the boy in question was the younger 
Martin Perse. In the care which he bestowed on 
these three boys — and more especially the last 
mentioned — we can most certainly trace Taylor's 
gratitude for the early training which had laid in 
him " the good humour of a gentleman, the 
eloquence of an orator, the fancy of a poet, and the 
acuteness of a schoolman, the profoundness of a 
philosopher, the wisdom of a councillor, the 
sagacity of a prophet, the reason of an angel, and 
the piety of a saint." 



CHAPTER III 

THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD. (1636-52) 

The school remained under the care of Lovering 
and Martin Perse for the first eighteen years of its 
existence. Nothing better testifies to their con- 
scientious attention to duty than the fact that in the 
troublous times, which were to follow, the Perse 
weathered storms in which shipwreck would have 
been the fate of a school less securely established. 
The connection between the school and both 
Master and executor came to an end before the 
Civil War. Death carried off Martin Perse in the 
April of 1636, whilst he was serving the office of 
Mayor.^ At midsummer in the same year Lovering left 
Cambridge to become Master of Norwich Grammar 
School. At Norwich Lovering fully maintained 
the reputation which he had won at the Perse. He 

^ The Perse family continued to reside at Westwick ir Cambridge- 
shire, where Martin Perse was lord of the manor. Valentine Perse sold 
this property some time after 1652. The last known member of 
the family was William Perse (formerly of Christ's), who died 
rector of West Heslerton, Yorks, about 1723. 

40 



THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 41 

earned golden opinions from his pupils. Under 
his successor they looked back with regret on the 
days when they were " wont to be made by Mr. 
Loveringe Minerva's darlings," for their new 
master, Mr. Mazey — a former Persean be it con- 
fessed — suffered from the dread diseases known as 
** desidia, chiragra, and podagra," and had reduced 
his pupils to the intellectual miseries of ** Vulcan's 
servile bondslaves." * 

On the death of the last survivor of the three 
executors, the right of appointing the Master and 
Usher was to devolve, in accordance with the terms 
of the Founder's will, upon the Master and four 
senior Fellows of Caius College. Both Cary (d. 1622) 
and Spicer (d. 1629) had predeceased Martin Perse. 
Caius College was, therefore, called upon to exercise 
this right within three months of succession to the 
trusteeship. It can hardly be said that their first 
choice augured well for their conduct in the future. 
Richard Watson (Master, 1636-41) was certainly 
a distinguished scholar, but his appointment violated 
the school ordinance prohibiting pluralism, for he 
was a Fellow of Caius. The appointment afforded 
a disastrous precedent for the future, and was not 

1 Lovering remained headmaster of Norwich until his death in 
1667. Amongst his pupils at Norwich was the future Archbishop 
Tenison. 



42 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

justified in this particular instance by subsequent 
success. " A good scholar, but vain and conceited," 
was Antony a Wood's comment on Watson at a 
later date. To judge from Watson's own writings. 
Wood's criticism was sound. In his younger days 
he was certainly too self-centred to devote much 
energy to the management of the Perse. His 
attention was distracted by college and university 
matters. Besides holding a fellowship at Caius he 
undertook the duties of tutor and dean. In 1639 
he combined with these the office of college lecturer 
in rhetoric. He was also much in request as a 
preacher of a highly polemical order. In justice to 
Watson, it should be recorded that he did take a 
personal interest in some of his pupils at the Perse, 
and acted as tutor to four of them when they entered 
Caius. Against this must, however, be set several 
very significant facts. At the time of his resignation 
the steady stream of boys proceeding from the Perse 
to the University had become reduced to a mere 
trickle ; boys were no longer attracted to the school 
from places beyond the immediate neighbourhood ; 
and last, but not least, no less than one-third of the 
free scholars' places were vacant when Watson left.^ 

^ Watson was ejected from his fellowship at Caius in 1644 for 
preaching a sermon at Great St. Mary's Church " touching schism " 
(printed in 1642). He subsequently fled to the Continent. At the 
Restoration he was restored to his fellowship and became chaplain 



THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 43 

Learning wisdom from the result of their previous 
transgression of the school ordinances, the Trustees 
conformed to the ordinances in appointing Watson's 
successor. At the same time they entered 
thoroughly into the spirit of the Founder's will by 
appointing a former Persean. Thomas Crabbe 
(Master, 164.1-^1) was the son of a Cambridge 
alderman, and had been a pupil of Lovering. He 
was the first and most successful of the three Masters 
who received their early education at the school. 
Ralph Harison, another Persean, was appointed 
Usher at the same time, and on his resignation three 
years later another old boy was appointed in the 
person of Robert Crayford. Thus a laudable 
attempt was made to foster a healthy feeling of 
esprit de corps, which, had it been permitted to 
continue, might well have brought the Perse to the 
forefront in the scholastic world. The experiment 
immediately proved successful. Indeed but for the 
patriotism of the masters the school might never 
have weathered the stormy decade which was now 
to begin. 



to James, Duke of York. He died in 1685. Antony k Wood, in 
his Athenae Oxonienses, says that he was ejected from his Mastership 
at the Perse for his sermon " touching schism," and Cooper has 
repeated this statement in his Annals of Cambridge. The Perse 
Accounts, however, show that Watson had resigned from the Perse 
before the sermon was preached. 



44 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

The coming of Crabbe was at once followed by 
an increase in the number of boys. During the 
first month of his Mastership no less than thirty- 
three free scholars were admitted. From the sur- 
viving sheets of a lost register we learn that between 
April, 1 64 1, and July, 1649, there were no less than 
one hundred and twenty-seven entries — and this in 
spite of the fact that the country was filled with the 
alarums and excursions of the Civil War and that 
Cambridge suffered from recurring visitations of the 
plague. As many as twenty-three of these boys are 
known to have proceeded to the University, and of 
these seven ultimately became fellows of their 
colleges. Others, in later life, became prominent 
members of the Corporation of Cambridge. The 
boys were drawn from all classes. The great 
majority were the sons of tradesmen and college 
servants, and these figure largely amongst those who 
obtained university honours. The professional 
classes also sent their sons to the school. Two of 
the boys were the sons of Dr. Love, Master of 
Corpus, whose confidence in Crabbe is a notable 
tribute to the latter's ability. For a time, indeed, 
it looked as if the traditions of the Lovering regime 
would be revived in full. This hope was, however, 
not to be realised, but its non-fulfilment can in no 
way be imputed to Crabbe. 



THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 45 

A few months after his appointment Crabbe 
received an Irish boy, named John Sterne, into the 
school. This boy had fled with his father from 
Drogheda on the outbreak of the Irish Rebellion. ^ 
As he received young Sterne into the school, Crabbe 
could not but have been impressed with the gloomy 
outlook in public affairs. The Irish Rebellion 
was but the prelude to more widespread strife. In 
the latter part of 1 642 differences between King and 
Parliament came to a head, and bloodshed was 
inevitable. Adherents of both parties began to 
arm. Crabbe's old schoolfellow, John Pepys, 
attempted to smuggle arms into Cambridge for the 
use of the Royalists in the University. Only two 
chests of arms reached their destination. The 
remaining eight were seized owing to the vigilance 
of the member for the borough, Oliver Cromxwell. 
In fact, the member for Cambridge was quick to 
secure East Anglia for Parliament. On an evening 
in March 1643, Lovering may well have seen his 
former Cambridge pupil, Tollemache Castell of 
Raveningham, brought by Cromwell a prisoner of 
war into Norwich after assisting his father in a vain 
attempt to raise the King's standard in Norfolk. 

So far as Cambridge was concerned, the contest 
was soon decided. The town became the head- 

^ Entry in Sidney College Admission Register, October 3, 1645. 



46 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

quarters of the Eastern Counties Association, of 
which Neville Butler, another of Crabbe's school- 
fellows, was a prominent member. Though alarms 
of threatened Royalist attacks were many, neither 
Cambridge nor its immediate neighbourhood was 
the scene of actual fighting. For a short time the 
Royalist sympathies of the University caused Parlia- 
ment some anxiety, but in 1644 the Manchester 
Commissioners removed the most prominent 
opponents of Parliament from office, and after that 
year the Royalist element ceased to exist. 

We know that Crabbe's sympathies were with the 
Royal party. At the Restoration he was rewarded 
by preferment in the Church and University. As 
Master of the Perse, however, Crabbe eschewed the 
political controversies of the time. The people of 
Cambridge were heart and soul for the Parliament. 
Amongst Crabbe's pupils were the sons of some of 
the stalwarts of the Parliamentary party. It speaks 
highly not only for Crabbe's political moderation but 
also for his reputation as a schoolmaster that he had 
the confidence of his fellow-townsmen, and that 
during this difficult period not a single allegation 
of " scandalousness " or '* insufficiency " was ever 
made against him. 

In spite of the Master's tact and moderation the 
Civil War was destined to affect the fortunes of the 



THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 47 

Perse very seriously. The county of Essex suffered 
severely from the heavy taxation imposed upon it. 
The Prating tenants were considerable sufferers, and 
professed themselves unable to pay their rents. 
Owing to the distance and the unsettled state of the 
country, the Trustees found it impossible to collect 
all their rents, even supposing the money had been 
forthcoming. At Christmas, 1643, the income of 
the trust had almost vanished. Retrenchment alone 
would save the situation. Accordingly it was agreed 
to reduce the salaries of all officers connected with 
the trust. The Master and Usher found their 
stipends reduced temporarily by one-half, and had 
to rest content with vague promises of receiving their 
arrears in full when finances would permit of it. 

Both Crabbe and his Usher, Robert Crayford, 
stuck loyally to their posts during the next four 
critical years. The year 1 644 perhaps saw matters 
looking their blackest. Only four free scholars 
were admitted. Owing to the disturbed state of 
the country hardly a single boarder attended the 
school, and the masters were thus deprived of one 
possible means of recouping themselves for their 
lost income. To add to these troubles, in the 
autumn a storm damaged the roof and chimneys of 
the school, and the cost of repairs absorbed a large 
part of the remaining scanty income of the trust. 



48 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

In 1645, thanks to the energy of the masters, the 
horizon began to look brighter. The entry rose to 
eleven, to rise again to seventeen in the following 
year. In 1647 the two masters received part of 
their back pay. Twelve months later the remaining 
arrears were paid off, and the Master and Usher 
were once more allowed their full stipends. The 
outlook brightened generally. The threatened 
disaster had been averted, and the school saved by 
the disinterested patriotism of two of its old boys. 

With the crisis past, it might have been expected 
that Crabbe would be allowed to govern the school 
in peace. Unhappily for him this was not to be. 
In 1649 the Manchester Commissioners appointed 
William Dell to the mastership of Caius on the 
ejection of Thomas Batchcroft, who was a Royalist. 
As Master of Caius Dell became ex-officio chairman 
of the Perse trustees. He had formerly been 
chaplain to the New Model Army, and in religious 
matters was a man of few sympathies and many 
antipathies. His claim to celebrity does not, how- 
ever, rest upon the eccentricity of his religious 
views, but upon the very modern theories on educa- 
tion propounded in his Right Reformation of Learning. 

The greater part of Dell's book is devoted to an 
attack on the monopoly of university teaching then 
enjoyed by Cambridge and Oxford. For us, how- 




OLD SCHOOL IN FREE SCHOOL LANE (INTERIOR), AS USED FOR THE 
MEETING OF THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION, 1845 



THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 49 

ever, the main interest lies in the first portion of 
this book, which advocates a complete reformation 
of the grammar school system. Dell insists that 
the education of youth is a matter for the State and 
recommends the establishment of schools throughout 
the country, not only in towns but also in villages. 
In these schools he would have a more extended 
range of subjects, as well as a greater discrimination 
in their treatment. The instructors should first 
teach their pupils " to read their native tongue, which 
they know without understanding : and then 
presently as they understand, bring them to read 
the Holy Scriptures ; which though for the present 
they understand not, yet they may through the 
blessing of God, come to understand them after- 
wards.*' In towns, the scholars should be taught 
** also the Latin and Greek tongues, and the Hebrew 
also, which is the easiest of them all, and ought to 
be in great account with us for the Old Testament's 
sake." But a very careful selection is to be made of 
the classical authors. 

" My counsel is that they learn the Latin and Greek 
tongues especially from Christians, and so without the hes, 
fables, follies, vanities, lust, pride, revenge, etc. of the 
heathens ; especially seeing that neither their words nor 
their phrases are meet for Christians to take into their 
mouths : and most necessary it is, that Christians should 
forget the names of their gods and muses, which were but 

P.S. D 



so HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

devils and damned creatures, and all their mythology and 
fabulous inventions, and let them all go to Satan from 
whence they came." 

Ovid and Virgil are thus consigned to perdition, and 
practically every vi^riter who has hitherto been 
studied is to be excluded from the syllabus of the 
reformed grammar school. 

Dell had a good opportunity of putting his 
reforms to a practical test at the Perse. He was, it 
is true, frequently absent from Cambridge, and 
cannot have very actively superintended the carrying 
out of his theories. Nevertheless, we know that he 
interested himself in other matters connected with 
the school, and can hardly doubt that as a soi-disant 
educationalist he availed himself of the opportunity 
of experimenting along the lines of his theories. 
Crabbe probably offered little opposition to some of 
Dell's innovations, but he was thoroughly con- 
servative at heart, and must have regarded with 
misgiving the drastic changes proposed in the 
teaching of classics. Dell's known eccentricity of 
character and impracticability of temper made even 
men of advanced views chary of endorsing the 
sentiments of the Right Reformation of Learning. 

Under the circumstances, it was to be expected 
that differences would arise between Crabbe and Dell. 
At Michaelmas, 1652, we jfind the post of Master of 



THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD 51 

the Perse School vacant. Crabbe's departure was 
obviously unexpected, for the Trustees were mo- 
mentarily at a loss to find a successor. Further- 
more the resignation cannot have been altogether 
voluntary, for Crabbe held no other post in view 
when he left.^ It is not unreasonable to suppose 
that owing to friction with Dell he had found his 
position insufferable, and had been induced or 
compelled to resign. His past sacrifices for the 
school had merited freedom from such molestation, 
and our sympathies must be with him rather than 
with Dell. Enlightened as many of Dell's views 
were, it must not be forgotten that his own age 
regarded him as an eccentric and a crank. It was 
Crabbe's misfortune that such a man came across 
his path. 

Indirectly Crabbe's retirement was due to the 
revolution in the world of politics. Other Perseans 
were more directly victims of the troubles of the 
Civil War and of the passing of the Act of Uni- 
formity in 1662. They were to be found in both 
camps, and included soldiers and clergy. Reference 
has already been made to the parts played by John 
Pepys, Tollemache Castell, and Neville Butler in 

1 Crabbe held no ecclesiastical or scholastic appointment until 
the Restoration. He was then elected a Fellow of Caius. He was 
ordained in 1670 and became rector of Hardwick, Norfolk, where 
he died in 1680. 



52 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

the early days of the Civil War. In the later stages 
of the war we find others fighting on the Royalist 
side. John, second Viscount Chaworth, garrisoned 
his house at Wiverton, Notts, for the King, 
and later shared in the defence of Newark, for 
which acts his estates were sequestrated by Parlia- 
ment. Edmund Thorold ^ was also one of the 
defenders of Newark. Richard Naylor of God- 
manchester was another active Royalist, and at the 
Restoration was proposed as one of the knights of 
the intended Order of the Royal Oak. Jeremy 
Taylor was at one time a chaplain to the Royalist 
Army, and suffered imprisonment for the part he 
played. A similar fate befell Robert Dixon, who 
in his own time had a considerable reputation as a 
writer of theological treatises. ^ James Lukyn, 
vicar of Puddletown, Dorset, was sequestrated from 
his living, but " lived to be restored and died the 
faithful pastor of his church." In a younger 
generation, Thomas Wilson of Caius College allowed 
his perfervid royalism to get him into trouble with 
the Vice-chancellor, who in 1649 suspended him 
from his degree " for drinking a health to the King 
and confusion to Tom [sc. Fairfax]." 

1 Fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge, 1634 ; Prebendary of 
Lincoln, i66o. 

^ A full account of Dixon is given in the Dictionary of National 
Biography. 



THE CIVIL WAR PERIOD S3 

The Act of Uniformity drove more than one 
Persean out of his living. Amongst the Indepen- 
dents can be mentioned John Yaxley,^ Andrew 
Thomaton,^ and James Thelwall.^ Thomas ElHs 
was deprived of the living of Lopham, Norfolk, for 
holding Anabaptist tenets. Thomas Owen, rector 
of Bramfield, Herts, signed the Solemn League and 
Covenant, and for that reason was deprived in 1660 : 
subsequently he conformed, and died vicar of Sund- 
ridge in Kent. Richard Laurence, a man " humble 
and inoffensive in his carriage, and generally well 
spoken of," was ejected in 1662 from the rectory 
of Trunch, Norfolk, and for a time was pastor to the 
Independent congregation at Amsterdam. 

1 Rector of Kibworth, Leicester. ^ Rector of Scrivelsby, Lines. 

2 Vicar of Whiston, Yorks. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE COMMONWEALTH AND RESTORATION PERIOD. 

(1652-87) 

When Dell and his colleagues got rid of Crabbe, 
they had no nominee to put in his place. They 
deferred making any new appointment for four 
months. During the Michaelmas term the Usher, 
Crayford, undertook the entire management of the 
school, and was allowed fourteen pounds for his 
pains. At Christmas, 1652, the Trustees appointed 
George Griffith of Queens' to the vacant post. The 
new Master was a native of London, and had 
originally been a member of Emmanuel, Dell's 
former college and a stronghold of Puritanism. In 
the early days of 1645 ^^^ Manchester Com- 
missioners put him into a fellowship at Queens'. 
His previous record was therefore sufficient to enable 
him to find favour with Dell and his co-trustees. 

As can be gathered from subsequent events, 
Robert Crayford was bitterly disappointed that the 

Mastership was not conferred on him. It is not 

54 



COMMONWEALTH, RESTORATION 5s 

altogether clear why the Trustees did not promote 
him in view of his past services to the school. At 
a later date they declared that he was ineligible, 
because in 1651 he had accepted the curacy of 
Haslingfield, ** wherebye ye Ushers place was much 
deserted." According to the school ordinances this 
certainly was a bar to his promotion, but by the same 
ordinances he was equally ineligible for the post of 
Usher. The Trustees had no right to retain him 
in one post and debar him from the other. Further- 
more, if the ordinances were to be enforced against 
Crayford, it was very unjust that they were not made 
to operate against Griffith, who at the time of his 
appointment still held a fellowship at Queens'. 

Whatever sympathy may be felt for Crayford in 
his disappointment is altogether alienated by his 
subsequent conduct. The new Master's position 
could not have been easy under any circumstances. 
Crayford did his utmost to make it difficult. On 
October 20th, 1653, in defiance of both Trustees 
and Master he intruded seven boys into the school, 
who were ineligible for free scholars' places. It 
is hardly credible that such an act of defiance should 
have been possible — still less credible that the 
Trustees should have been unable to remove the 
intruders at once — ^yet such was the case. These 
seven boys frequented the school during the whole 



S6 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

of the Michaelmas term, and did not leave until 
Crayford himself left.^ 

On finding that he could defy the governors* 
orders, Crayford went still further. Other acts of 
unruliness followed, culminating in open insubordi- 
nation. In the words of one of the scandalised 
governors, 

•' Before all y* Schollers he in a most violent manner 
made an assault upon George Griffith, he the saide George 
in the peace of God & the publicke peace then & there 
beinge : and said also scandalous, opprobrious, & reproach- 
full words following to Griffith, to witt, you are a strikinge 
knave : you come to steale away my due : I will take you 
a kicke on the britch & tred in your feete." 

Insubordination was followed by acts of scandalous 
barbarity towards the boys. Several instances of his 
cruelty are recorded, and these leave behind them 
the impression that the Usher was not altogether 
sane. We read, for instance, of 

" One Thomas Peters, whom y^ saide Robert Crayford 
wrung by both his eares in y^' violent manner that one of 
his eares was cruelly torne both skinn and grissle & almost 
went from his head : y^ said Thomas Peters goeinge home 
to his mother Katherine Peters house in Cambridge with 
his eare soe torne & bleedinge to her great affrightment, 

^ The following information is given in the Sidney Admission 
Register, under the date August 22, 1657, concerning John ChishuU. 
who is mentioned as being one of the intruded scholars : " institutus 
Uteris grammaticis primo quidem Cantabrigiae nostrae in schola 
Perciana sed non amplius quatuor menses." 



COMMONWEALTH, RESTORATION 57 

the blood runninge downe y^ body of the said Thomas 
Peters from his head unto his feet. 

'• And y^ saide Robt. Crayford did in such unmercifull 
and cruell manner whip one John Spratford, one of y® 
Schollers in y^ free grammer schoole of Cambridge aforesaide, 
y*' his body was sor gashed and torne by his cruell stripes, 
that he could scarce indure to lay himselfe downe in his 
bed at night. And after complaint thereof made to the 
said Robert Crayford by John Spratford, of the Towne of 
Cambridge, father of the said John Spratford, y® said John 
was still from tyme to tyme so harshly dealt with by the 
said Robert Crayford, that the said John Spratford was 
constrained att length to take his said sonne from y^ said 
free schoole S- put to him to a private grammer schoole in 
Cambridge. 

" And y^ said Robt. Crayford did smite one Edward 
Webb, being one of y^ Schollers in y^ free grammer schoole, 
in a most violent manner upon his jawes & beat hym 
downe with his head against a wooden forme. Webb 
riseing upp again, Crayford smote him y^ second tyme in 
like manner in soe much y"' his head and jawes were soe 
bruised, y**' the saide Edward was in very great danger 
of death, Edward Webbe, father of y® saide Edward, 
being a Chirurgeon, besides his own skill in Chirurgerie, wh. 
he used for his sonne his care, took the advise of one Doctor 
Eade, a knowne & skilfull Physician, who gave y^ sonne 
over fearinge y^' he was not curable : yet it pleased God 
y^' after five weekes he did some what recover, but is 
to this day by the cruell usage of Crayford soe much dis- 
abled in his speech & also in his memorie, y^' his father 
to his great greife was necessitated to divert him from y® 
way of a scholler to a seruilar imploym'." 

Obviously such acts as these did a great deal of harm 
to the school. The time had come for the Trustees 



58 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

to dispense with the Usher's services. Accordingly 
at Christmas, 1653, Crayford was dismissed, and 
his place given to John Felton, Fellow of Caius. 

But matters did not end here. Crayford was 
occupying the Usher's house, and he refused to 
surrender it. His dismissal aroused the indignation 
of certain townspeople, " more," we are told, " in 
opposition to the college [sc. Caius] than in friend- 
ship to him." It is well-nigh inconceivable that 
after his recent conduct Crayford could have found 
many sympathisers in Cambridge : yet sympathisers 
he undoubtedly had. Without their assistance he 
could not have defied the Trustees for so long a 
period as he did. They encouraged him to contest 
the decision of the Trustees and to apply for a 
mandamus for his restitution. A writ of mandamus 
was in due course issued. With unconscious irony 
it declared that ever since his appointment to the 
post of Usher, Robert Crayford had " behaved 6-- 
governed himselfe welle, quietly, soberly, & 
honestly," and commanded the Trustees to restore 
him to his post, unless good cause could be shown 
to the contrary. 

The Trustees at once entered a defence, and Dell 
deposed to all Crayford's past offences. Crayford 
was determined to vindicate himself at all costs and 
to obtain full compensation for " the manifest 



COMMONWEALTH, RESTORATION 59 

wearinge of his creditt Estate." The Trustees were 
equally determined not to have him back again, and 
went to considerable expense to fight the matter out. 
The legal proceedings, therefore, had to take their 
usual course. The writ had been issued on February 
13th, 1653-4, but it was not until the Trinity term 
of 1655 that the action came before the Court of the 
Upper Bench, as the King's Bench was then styled. 
At the hearing Crayford's counsel made a strong 
appeal for an order of restitution, but the Lord Chief 
Justice declined to intervene after learning that 
Crayford had *' much abused himself." He recom- 
mended the parties to refer their differences to the 
justices of assize, one of whom, Oliver St. John, was 
then Chancellor of Cambridge University. 

All these proceedings had been costly, as is shown 
by numerous items in the trust accounts for this 
period. The trust funds were still in low water, 
and a further prosecution of the quarrel would have 
involved a heavy drain on an already impoverished 
income. There were also considerations of an even 
more pressing nature. Crayford had not been 
evicted from the Usher's house. He still defied 
the Trustees in the very precincts of the school, and 
declined to surrender any of the school property, 
which had come into his hands as Usher. He 
endeavoured to be thoroughly offensive to Griffith. 



6o HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

Apparently the unfortunate Master had on more 
than one occasion to submit to insulting language of 
a nature very similar to that already recorded. 
Furthermore, Crayford's friends endeavoured to 
establish a boycott of the school. 

Obviously it was imperative to get the ex-Usher 
out of the way at all costs. The fortunes of the 
school were in jeopardy, and the situation was grow- 
ing daily more intolerable for the unfortunate 
Griffith. The Trustees decided to come to terms 
rather than prosecute the quarrel to a costly victory. 
Accordingly they abandoned the lawsuit, and effected 
a compromise with Crayford. On April 17, 1656, 
the parties entered into a composition. Crayford 
renounced all claims to the post and emoluments of 
Usher. In consideration therefor he was allowed 
to occupy the Usher's house for one year on his 
undertaking to " demean himselfe fairely, soberly, 
S- inoffensively to the Master & Usher of the 
schoole for the tyme beinge." Apparently Crayford 
abided faithfully by the agreement, for there was no 
more trouble. At the latter end of 1657 he left 
Cambridge to take the living of East Grinstead in 
Sussex, where he died in 1683. His was an ill- 
balanced mind, and some of his acts savoured of 
madness. His two years' defiance of the Trustees 
and Master showed a dogged pertinacity in fighting 



COMMONWEALTH, RESTORATION 6i 

a desperate cause, which calls forth a regret that it 
was not put to a better use. Whilst we condemn his 
scandalous barbarity and insubordination, we must 
not forget his disinterested patriotism at a critical 
moment in the school's history. Twenty years later 
his son returned to Cambridge, and was received 
into his father's old college at Caius. As a Perse 
Scholar and Perse Fellow he cleared the name of 
the obloquy brought upon it by his father's conduct. 
Though Crayford was gone, Griffith was by no 
means out of troubled waters. The dispute might 
be settled, but the ill feeling aroused thereby did 
not easily die down. A section of the townspeople 
still bore a grudge against the school, and could still 
boycott the Perse by sending boys to private schools 
in the town. Fortunately, Griffith was not wanting 
in tact, and in time all hostility disappeared. The 
first step taken to allay ill feeling was the resignation 
of the Usher. Felton's appointment had been the 
bone of contention from the very outset. His 
position was by no means enviable, and, as the salary 
attached to his post was diminishing, there was little 
inducement for him to remain. It was probably 
with very little reluctance that he resigned at the 
Michaelmas following Crayford's departure.^ 

1 Felton apparently took an interest in his pupils at the Perse, 
for he acted as tutor to two of them after their admission at Caius. 



62 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

We can trace the hand of the Master of Caius in 
the appointment of Felton's successor. John Boult 
supplied " the vacancies of prayers in chapel " at 
Caius College during this period, and was regarded 
as a Puritan in religion. He would, therefore, be 
considered eminently fitted to assist in furtherance 
of the projects set forth in the Right Reformation of 
Learning. The new Usher did not, however, stay 
longer at the school than twelve months.* His 
immediate successors were William Henry Rixe 
(Usher, 1657-67), William Peters (Usher, 1667-76), 
and Edward Sparkes (Usher, 1676-87). All three 
had originally been pupils of Griffith. In each case, 
however, the appointment was made in violation of 
the school ordinances, for each of them held either 
a fellowship or ecclesiastical preferment simultane- 
ously with the post of Usher. In the cases of Peters 
and Rixe little harm was done thereby, for both were 
able men. 2 Nevertheless, the bad precedent of 
Watson's time was revived, and was to have a serious 
effect on the fortunes of the school before the 
century was out. 

^ Like Felton Boult seems to have taken an interest in his pupils 
at the Perse, for he also acted as tutor to two Perseans on their 
admission at Caius, one of them being John Spratford (of. p. 57). 

- Rixe subsequently became Master of Saffron Walden. From 
the Sidney Admission Register (May 5, 1669) we learn that he took 
at least one of his pupils from the Perse to Saffron Walden. 



COMMONWEALTH, RESTORATION 63 

So long as Dell remained Master of Caius, 
Griffith's position could not have been altogether 
easy. The theories of the Right Reformation of 
Learning were still very dear to their author. The 
general public, on the other hand, regarded both 
author and theories with suspicion. Griffith, there- 
fore, had a difficult course to steer, if he desired to 
placate both parties. Fortunately, both for himself 
and the Perse, he had both moderation and discern- 
ment. Without alienating public opinion by radical 
innovation, he at the same time managed to avoid 
Crabbe's fate. At the Restoration this policy of 
moderation was justified. Dell ceased to be Master 
of Caius, and saw all his handiwork undone. 
Griffith was left undisturbed. His views on poli- 
tical and religious matters were not extreme, and 
must have caused bitter disappointment to the 
** outed " Master of Caius. Amongst the collection 
of verses composed by members of the University 
to welcome Charles II. on his return from exile we 
find a contribution by Griffith. With equally deep 
regret Dell must have read two other contributions 
from the ex-Ushers, Felton and Boult. 

After 1660 religious and political controversies 
ceased to play any part in the history of the school. 
Griffith was left to rule the Perse undisturbed by 
external events. The rest of his Mastership was 



64 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

comparatively peaceful. One event did, however, 
for the moment, interrupt the even tenour of school 
life. This was the plague. Throughout its history 
Cambridge was a frequent sufferer from pestilence. 
In 1630 the town suffered from an exceptionally 
severe visitation, which for a time must have com- 
pletely arrested the progress of the school. During 
Crabbe's Mastership the plague recurred in Cam- 
bridge almost annually. To judge, however, from 
the admission register for that period these visitations 
were regarded with comparative equanimity. Except 
perhaps for a period between April, 1643, ^^^ April, 
1 644, when no admissions are recorded, the regular 
routine of school life was not interrupted. The visita- 
tions of 1665 and the following year were far more 
serious matters. At Cambridge the plague proved 
most fatal in the autumn of 1666, when it claimed 
victims amongst the families of several boys then 
attending the school, and no doubt amongst the boys 
themselves. Griffith, apparently, had no alternative 
but to close the school for the time being. Some 
Perse boys were sent to neighbouring towns until the 
plague had abated. Edmund Ivory, for instance, 
was sent to Bury St. Edmunds and attended the 
school there, returning to the Perse when the 
visitation was past. By the spring of 1667 
the pestilence at Cambridge had run its course. 



COMMONWEALTH, RESTORATION 65 

Thereafter the continuity of school life was never 
again interrupted by plague. 

Meanwhile, through all the vicissitudes of politics, 
lawsuits, and pestilence, Griffith steadily increased 
his reputation as a schoolmaster. Parents, including 
persons of high social standing, sent their sons from 
all parts of the country to the Perse. Sir Ralph 
Hare of Stow Bardolph, Norfolk, sent his son 
Thomas.^ Another pupil, Edward Russell of 
Chippenham, came of a family closely allied by 
marriage with that of Cromwell.^ But the best 
evidence of Griffith's ability is revealed in the 
remarkable number of boys sent up to the University. 
We can trace sixty-seven entering six different 
colleges in Cambridge, and of this number no less 
than fifteen obtained fellowships. One, Christopher 
Greene, became Regius Professor of Physic, and 
proved his versatility by also holding the lectureships 
in Greek and Ethics at Caius. 

The most distinguished of all Griffith's pupils was 
undoubtedly Sir Robert Tabor.^ After leaving 

^ Thomas Hare succeeded to his father's baronetcy in 1671 whilst 
still at the Perse. He was a patron of the engraver, David Loggan, 
and represented Norfolk in Parliament 1685-88. 

' The father. Sir Francis Russell, was one of Cromwell's major- 
generals and a member of his upper house. His eldest son married 
the Protector's daughter. 

^ He was grandson of James Tabor, the well-known University 
Registrary. The Tabor family had a close connection with the 

P.S. E 



ee HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

school, Tabor was apprenticed to an apothecary in 
Cambridge. During his apprenticeship he dis- 
covered a satisfactory method of administering 
quinine in cases of fever. The opportunity for 
proving the value of his discovery came in 1678, 
when he managed by his remedy to save the life of 
Charles II., who in gratitude knighted him. His 
reputation spread to the continent. Louis XIV. 
sent for him to attend the Dauphin, and later he 
became medical adviser to the Queen Consort of 
Spain. 

Later in life another of Griffith's pupils made his 
mark as a commentator and as a pioneer of the 
evangelical movement. This was William Burkitt, 
concerning whose school career we have something 
more than the usual information. Whilst a boy 
** he was endowed with a very Tenacious Memory, 
which through the happiness of a good Education 
was made a Cabinet for Jewels, a Repository of 
Scripture and Catechism." Even at school he was 
of a deeply serious turn of mind. It was at the 
Perse that his vocation came to him. " While I 
continued at School in Cambridge," he tells us, " it 

Perse in its early days. Sir Robert's uncle, James, was a boy at 
the school. Matthew Whynne, who married the Registrary's 
daughter and succeeded his father-in-law in his office, was con- 
temporary with this second James at the Perse. Sir Robert Tabor's 
brother John was also a pupil of Griffith. 




PERSE SCHOOL CHRISTMAS ANNUAL, 1 874 



COMMONWEALTH, RESTORATION 67 

pleased God to visit me with the Small-Pox, but 
very favourably, and, as I hope, in great mercy, 
laying the Foundation of my Spiritual Health in 
that sickness, working, as I hope, a prevailing 
thorough change in the very Frame and disposition 
of my Soul." ^ 

As the school was in financial straits during the 
whole of his Mastership, Griffith's success is the 
more creditable. The end of the Civil War did not 
bring the hoped-for improvement of the Frating 
property. Moreover, whilst the trust income 
diminished, expenditure increased. Crayford's 
action had been costly. There were other heavy 
legal expenses incidental to the conveyance of the 
trust property from Thomas Batchcroft, the last 
surviving feofee under the Founder's will, to the 
Master and four senior fellows of Caius. In addi- 
tion to law costs, there were considerable outgoings 
for the upkeep of the fabric of the school. The 
trust accounts for 1668 record the payment of ten 
pounds to " one Perse a relation of Dr. Perses by 
the Colledgorder." It is indeed to be hoped that 
the recipient was worthy of his family, for it was not 
the time to throw away money in mistaken charity. 
To meet all these outgoings retrenchment was 

^ A full account of Burkitt is given iij the Dictionary of National 
Biography. 



68 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

practised at the expense of the unfortunate Master 
and Usher, who only on rare occasions received their 
full salaries. In 1678 Griffith's stipend was cut 
down to ^{^32 and that of his Usher to £,16. 

Griffith had a private income, and his heart was 
in his work. He was not, therefore, to be deterred 
by inadequate payment. He held the Mastership 
for thirty-four years. The beginning had been 
stormy : the end came amid peace. Nearly half a 
century had passed since the day on which he first 
came as a stranger to the University. Since then his 
whole life had been centred in Cambridge. In his 
early days he had been the subject of quarrels and 
much bitterness. By his own effort he lived down 
all antipathies, and gained the universal respect of 
his fellow townsmen. In the parish of St. Edward's 
he was till the end a leading figure — full of kindly 
thought for his humbler neighbours. The autumn 
of 1686 found him in faiUng health. On Michael- 
mas day he was unable to go to Caius College to 
receive his stipend, for the payment is recorded, but 
the customary receipt is absent. He just outlived 
the year. At length, on January 6th, 1687, his 
long and useful life ended. 

Griffith's will bears the date November 12th, 
1686. He left legacies to the poor of St. Edward's 
parish and the Perse almswomen, as well as one 



COMMONWEALTH, RESTORATION 69 

hundred pounds to Hobson's Charity " for the 
setting the poore on work." But to us the most 
interesting legacy is the sum of one hundred pounds 
bequeathed to the Master and four Senior Fellows 
of Caius " to be by them employed to the best 
advantage for a supplement to the revenues of Dr. 
Stephen Perses Free School in Cambridge." To 
this benefaction his executrix adds certain of his 
"goods and utensills of household stuff" to the 
value of fifty pounds for the free use of his successors 
in the Mastership. 

In 1 841, when the school ordinances were re- 
modelled, the revisers fittingly perpetuated this 
bequest by making the following order : 

" In the prayers to be used at the times that the Scholars 
do break up school before the vacations and the times they 
come together again after the said vacations, some mention 
shall be made of Dr, Perse the founder, and Mr. George 
Griffith and others the benefactors of the School, with 
giving thanks for the same." 



CHAPTER V 

DECLINE AND FALL (1687-1787) 

In his diary Alderman Samuel Newton gives the 
following record of certain events connected with 
the Perse, which occurred in the early days of 1687 : 

" 6th January being Thursday about 6 of the clock in the 
afternoone dyed Mr George Griffith Schoolemaster of the 
Freeschoole in Cambridge. Hee was laid in the ground in 
St Edwards Chancel on Saturday night following between 
8 and 9 of the clock. His funeral was on Tuesday in the 
afternoone beinge the nth day of January. 

" 9th January being Sunday after Evening Chappell at 
Caius College was Mr Edward Sparkes admitted Master of 
Dr Perses Free Schoole in Cambridge in the roome of Mr. 
Griffith deceased." 

The haste with which the Trustees made their 
appointment might well be called indecent. 
Griffith's obsequies had not yet been performed, 
when his successor was appointed. A general 
indifference to the duties of their trust — sympto- 
matic of worse to come — could be the only reason 

for their conduct. There was nothing in the 

70 



DECLINE AND FALL 71 

character or ability of the new Master to justify 
the extraordinary haste with which the appointment 
was made. As free scholar, Perse scholar at Caius, 
Usher, and Master of the school, Edward Sparkes 
was connected with the Perse foundation for sixty- 
five years, and few have so ill repaid their alma 
mater. As Usher during Griffith's declining years, 
he had apparently been more or less in sole charge 
of the school, and there had been a general falling 
off in the number of the pupils. Furthermore, 
in 1686 Sparkes had violated the school ordinances 
by accepting the living of Shepreth and, notwith- 
standing, had been allowed to remain at the Perse. 
The financial difficulties confronting the school 
at this time might well have discouraged an abler 
man than Sparkes. After 1693 Griffith's bequest 
brought in an annual sum of ^^ los., which was 
employed to supplement the masters' stipends, but 
the falling off in the remainder of the trust revenues 
continued. In 1688 both Master and Usher found 
their salaries reduced by one-half. The salaries 
remained at these figures until 171 6, when they 
were raised to £2^ and ^i ^ respectively. It was 
not until 1735 that the full statutable incomes were 
once more paid to the two masters. The self- 
sacrifice of Crabbe was a tradition of the past of 
which Sparkes was oblivious. Being utterly devoid 



72 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

of ambition, he was content to remain as he was, to 
obtain what salary he could, and to do the least 
possible required for the earning of it. 

During the first ten years following Griffith's 
death a fair sprinkling of boys proceeded from the 
Perse to the University, but most of them were 
unremarkable and none of them subsequently 
distinguished themselves either in the academic or 
other spheres of life. Such credit as may be due 
for their success was perhaps as much due to the 
Ushers as the Master. Robert Pate, Sparkes' first 
Usher, was certainly a man of some ability, and 
subsequently became Master of Norwich School.^ 
His stay at the Perse, however, was limited to a 
single term. At the end of that period we find him 
keeping a private school in Cambridge. Several 
boys, who were originally at the Perse, attended this 
school — a circumstance which clearly indicates that 
all was not well at the Perse. 

On Pate's resignation the Trustees for once broke 
with the old custom of appointing Caius men to the 
post of Usher. Their choice fell on James Gill of 
Pembroke Hall,^ but on his death in 1692 they 
reverted to their former practice, appointing Thomas 
Inyon, who was already a Fellow of Caius. There- 

* Pate had been a boy at the Perse under Griffith. 

^ He was a native of Cambridge and perhaps educated at the Perse. 



DECLINE AND FALL 73 

after, until the nineteenth century had begun, not a 
single appointment was made from outside of Caius 
College, and the majority of those appointed were 
Fellows of the College. It is not surprising, there- 
fore, to discover that at the opening of the eighteenth 
century the Perse had ceased to be the leading 
school in the town, having given place to King's 
College School. 

The year 1 703 saw the establishment of charity 
schools in Cambridge.^ Their establishment had 
a disastrous effect on the fortunes of the Perse. The 
children were, it is true, drawn from the humblest 
class and received the most elementary education. 
Nevertheless, in bygone days some of the ablest 
Perseans had been born of relatively poor parents. 
The teaching Sparkes gave offered little prospect of 
much advancement in life, and as the charity schools 
provided a sound utilitarian training, the humbler 
townspeople after 1703 ceased to send their boys 
to the Perse. Thus the school practically lost an 
important class, from which had sprung Jeremy 
Taylor and others of the ablest and most dis- 
tinguished of its past pupils. 2 

^ Now known as the Old Schools, 

^ A charity school was established at Trumpington in 1679 by a 
certain William Austin. Between 1687 and 1836 not a single 
record can be found of a Trumpington boy attending the Perse 
school. 



74 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

With rivals in the field, the Perse required an 
Usher of some ability and character to supplement 
the mediocre talents of Sparkes. The least likely 
appointment to check the decay now setting in was 
that made in 1704 on Inyon's retirement. The 
Trustees could think of no more suitable person 
than the headmaster's own son. Brought up under 
the uninspiring tutelage of his father, his whole life 
confined within the narrow limits of his native town, 
the younger Sparkes entirely lacked that originality 
which alone could infuse new life into the school. 
He was a mere replica of the headmaster. For 
eighteen years the school was allowed to stagnate 
under this family arrangement. The monotony of 
perpetual deterioration was only broken when the 
son violated the school ordinances by accepting a 
living in Hertfordshire. His pluralism was 
tolerated for two years. At length, on his appoint- 
ment in 1722 to the living of Ugley in Essex, 
either his conscience or that of the Trustees became 
somewhat tardily reproachful, and the post of 
Usher became vacant. 

The elder Sparkes was now bordering on seventy 
and required a competent assistant to manage the 
school. Neither of his last two Ushers can be 
described as competent. Joseph Brett (Usher, 
1722-24) certainly was not without ability. He 



DECLINE AND FALL 75 

subsequently became Master of Wymondham and 
Scarning Schools. But his methods of enforcing 
discipline were too brutal even for a generation not 
over squeamish in such matters. He was dismissed 
from Scarning for acts of gross cruelty to the 
children of the parish. Brett's successor, Daniel 
Munnings (Usher, 1724-27), had not even the 
merits of Brett. As Cole informs us, he was a 
spendthrift and " soon wasted his wife's fortune 
and died insolvent." 

In 1727, Sparkes died suddenly at Shepreth,^ at 
the age of seventy-three. After his forty years' rule 
the state of the Perse was indeed deplorable. Boys 
no longer proceeded from the school to the 
University. In fact, the numbers attending the 
school were so few that the Trustees considered 
the services of a second Master superfluous. For 
the time being, Munnings was placed in sole charge 
and allowed to draw the salaries of both Master and 
Usher. 

An effort was made to deal with the situation six 
months later, when Munnings resigned. The 
Trustees, however, again resorted to their old 
practice of appointing Fellows of their own college, 
choosing Nathaniel Saltier as Master and Henry 
Goodall as Usher. There is little to be said 

^ St. Edward's Parish Register, May 24, 1727. 



76 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

concerning Saltier's Mastership (1728-32). The 
school remained in the same state as in the latter 
days of Sparkes. The Bishop of Ely found only 
ten scholars in the school during a visitation of his 
diocese in 1731.^ Even the confined premises in 
Free School Lane provided more than ample 
accommodation for this small number. Saltier 
realised this, and decided to eke out his very in- 
adequate salary by letting the school. The build- 
ings had ceased to be used as a school before 1731, 
for in that year the governors paid Mr. Jacob 
Butler of Barnwell Abbey a fee of one guinea " for 
pleading y* y^ Freeschool should not be assessed to 
y^ rates," — an item which shows that the school was 
then occupied as a dwelling house or workshop. As 
a matter of fact, it is known who was Saltier's tenant. 
He was a certain Bernard Turner, who, besides 
being organist of St. John's, carried on the business 
of organ builder in the town. He occupied one of 
the two masters' houses, and used the school room 
as his workshop. In a note on Turner, Cole tells 
us that ** in the schole I saw several of his organs, 
harpsichords, and spinets ; and I suppose he used 
it as his workshop, the schole having been neglected 
there many years : though when I first went to the 
University there was a flourishing schole." 

1 Add. MS. 7827. p. 89. 



DECLINE AND FALL 77 

To judge from the practice of one of his suc- 
cessors, Saltier probably retained the Master's 
house for his own use. His few pupils must have 
been taught there or else in his college rooms. 

In 1732 Saltier resigned and was succeeded by 
his Usher, Henry Goodall (Master, 1732-50). The 
new Master has best been described by Cole : 

" He was of a mould framed by Nature, education, and 
constitution to be a bishop's chaplain : all humbleness, 
obsequiousness, flattery, and distance. The bishop [sc. of 
Ely] bred him up to the trade, in which he succeeded very 
well, . . . tho' to do him justice . . ., a very honest, sober, 
good-tempered man." 

Goodall gained notoriety as a pluralist in an age 

of pluralism. He attached himself to the person of 

Sir Thomas Gooch, Master of Caius and Bishop of 

Bristol, Norwich, and Ely successively. There is 

no doubt that he succeeded very well at the trade. 

When Gooch, as ex-officio chairman of the Trustees, 

secured the Mastership of the Perse for his chaplain, 

Goodall was already a Fellow of Caius. In 1742 

his patron obtained the living of Mattishall in 

Norfolk for him by an act of gross jobbery.^ Five 

^ The Master and Fellows of Caius were the patrons of the living, 
but the Fellows did not want to present Goodall. Being fully 
aware of this fact, Gooch as Master of Caius declined to convene 
a college meeting. The appointment therefore lapsed to the Bishop 
of the diocese, who was none other than Gooch himself. Goodall 
was then appointed forthwith. 



78 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

years later he was given the two livings of Bixley 
and Framlingham Earl in the same county, and 
twelve months later became Archdeacon of Suffolk. 
During the whole of this period he remained 
Master of the Perse. 

As Goodall spent most of his time in attendance 
on his patron, the school was left to the care of his 
Ushers,^ who, fortunately, were not so neglectful of 
their duties as the Master. Almost for the first 
time since the days of Griffith boys came to the 
school from places beyond the immediate neigh- 
bourhood, and once more a few Perseans proceeded 
to the University. Of the three Ushers responsible 
for this recovery Charles Davy (Usher, 1747-51) 
deserves more than passing reference. Later in 
life he published Letters addressed chiefly to a Young 
Gentleman (1787) and several other treatises on 
education, which have obtained a place for him in 
the Dictionary of National Biography. In his Letters 
he advocates the introduction of more mathematical 
and scientific training into school teaching, and 
attacks the old grammar school system with some 
vigour. 

1 James Willson (Usher 1732-40), Robert Goodrich (Usher 1740-47), 
and Charles Davy (Usher 1747-51). Of these Goodrich is remembered 
as the dean who quarrelled with and earned the life-long respect 
of the future Lord Chancellor Thurlow at the time when the latter 
was a turbulent Perse Scholar of Caius. 



DECLINE AND FALL 79 

" I have ever been of opinion," he writes, " that giving up 
ten or twelve years of human life to two dead languages are 
more than we can afford. In the number of young gentlemen 
of fortune, who are educated at our best pubhc schools, 
scarce one in five hundred, perhaps, proves a very considerable 
classic scholar, and what with the neglect of science amongst 
those few, and that small attention which is paid to their 
religious principles, a greater part of them turn mere classic 
writers only." 

The foregoing opinions were apparently the 
result of reflection in the retirement of the Norfolk 
rectory in which Davy ended his days. There is 
nothing to show that he put his theories into practice 
at the Perse. Indeed, from what little is known of 
his career as a schoolmaster, it would appear that 
he did not rise superior to his own times. Like so 
many of his predecessors, he violated the school 
ordinances by combining his duties at the Perse with 
that of serving the curacy of Stow in Norfolk. For 
us the interest of Davy's Letters lies in the fact that 
the Young Gentleman to whom they were addressed 
was his own son, who forty years later had the 
opportunity as Master of the Perse of putting his 
father's theories into practice. 

Throughout Goodall's time the numbers attend- 
ing the school must have been very small. The 
organ-builder was still permitted to occupy the 
schoolhouse and one of the masters' houses. An 



8o HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

incident, which is recorded in the life of Christopher 
Smart, shows the insignificance to which the Perse 
had sunk. At this date. Smart, who was afterwards 
to be known to fame for his Song to David, was a 
Fellow of Pembroke and was scandalizing the whole 
University by his levity and numerous escapades. 
In April, 1747, he shocked the whole academic 
world by proposing to stage a play of his own 
composition, entitled A Trip to Cambridge. 
Dramatic performances had gone out of vogue at 
Cambridge long before this date, and Smart had 
difficulty in finding a place wherein to stage his play. 
Seeing the schoolhouse deserted by its masters and 
Scholars he applied for the use of the premises. His 
request was, however, refused, and eventually the 
performance took place in the hall of Pembroke. 

After holding the Mastership for eighteen years, 
Goodall resigned, and his place was taken by Roger 
Sturgeon (Master, 1750-59). The new Master 
appears to have been the last to have resided in 
Free School Lane for many years to come. He 
held two livings — Waterbeach in Cambridgeshire 
and Hardmead in Buckinghamshire — but neither 
of these were rich. Although a scholar of some 
ability, academic preferment never came his way. 
He had a wife and family to maintain on a very 
inadequate income, and in the end, as Cole informs 



DECLINE AND FALL 8i 

us, ** died very poor." Nevertheless, for his times 
Sturgeon was extremely conscientious. His 
parishioners at Hardmead no doubt learnt the evils 
of absenteeism, but he was scrupulous in the per- 
formance of his duties at Waterbeach and at the 
Perse. At the school he evidently made a struggle 
to remedy the neglect of the past. A few more 
boys were sent to the University, the most con- 
spicuous being Henry Turner, who was the son of 
Sturgeon's tenant and subsequently became a Fellow 
of St. John's. 

Sturgeon died at his house in Free School Lane in 
1 759. His pathetic struggle against poverty showed 
how impossible it was at this date to expect a master 
to devote his entire energies to his school when paid 
the utterly inadequate salary of forty pounds. It 
is not surprising, therefore, to find that in the next 
eight years four Masters were appointed in rapid 
succession.^ The meagre stipends of the Master 
and Usher had to be augmented by work outside 
the school, which prevented them from devoting 
their full time to their pupils. Finally the Masters 
endeavoured to supplement their incomes by letting 

1 Samuel Story (Master, 1759-64), James Coery (Master, 1764-66), 
Samuel Reeve (Master, 1766-67), and John Franklin Squire (Master, 
Oct.-Dec. 1767.) In 1789 Reeve, when Senior Proctor, hung 
himself in Caius College. His body was not found for several 
months and the matter afforded scandal-mongers much speculation, 
p.s. F 



82 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

their house in Free School Lane. Such few pupils 
as they had came to them in their college rooms. 
Even then the lessons given were infrequent and 
irregular, being scamped by masters and boys alike. 

Fortunately, some of the Masters, who were 
appointed during this period of decline, did make 
slight efforts to avert impending ruin. William 
White (Master, 1767-74), for instance, appears to 
have devoted a little attention to his scholars, for 
he has the credit of having produced one pupil who 
achieved a record in the annals of the Perse. The 
boy in question was Robert Towerson Cory, who 
subsequently entered Emmanuel.^ After gradu- 
ating as fifth wrangler, Cory became Fellow and 
subsequently Master of his college — the only 
Persean who has so filled such a post at either 
University. From 1809 to 18 13 he was also 
Knightbridge Professor of Moral Philosophy. 

If the mere names of masters were a true indica- 
tion of a school's prosperity, the Perse at this time 
should have been a flourishing school indeed. ^ 
White, for instance, had been Senior Wrangler ; 
Richard Fisher (afterwards Belward) became Master 
of Caius ; and John Jelliand Brundish obtained the 

1 Bowtell MSS. vii. 2724. 

* The Masters at this period were William Bond (1774-75), Richard 
Fisher (1775-81), John Jelliand Brundish (1781-82), Wilham Walford 
(Oct. -Dec. 1782), and Thomas Cooke Burroughes (1782-86). 



DECLINE AND FALL 83 

almost unique distinction of being Senior Wrangler, 

Senior Chancellor's Medallist, and Smith's Prizeman 

in one and the same year. The twelve months, 

however, during which the last-mentioned was 

Master of the Perse are a complete blank. Mr. 

Brundish received his stipend with the utmost 

regularity, but it is to be feared that he did nothing 

to earn it. By 1785, even the fiction of keeping 

the school open was abandoned. The Trustees 

still appointed masters, and the masters still received 

their stipends, but they had no pupils. It came to 

be almost the recognised custom for the Junior 

Fellows of Caius to hold the posts of Master and 

Usher in succession. 

By this date the Master's house had fallen into 

far worse hands than the school itself. In or about 

1780 it was occupied by Jemmy Gordon, a solicitor, 

who subsequently became a notorious character in 

Cambridge. 

" At the expiration of his articles," as readers of Gunning's 
Reminiscences will recall, " he commenced to practise in 
Free School Lane, in the house which ought to have been 
occupied by the Master of the Perse School, but which was 
at that time (through the neglect of the Trustees) let to the 
highest bidder : here he led an expensive and profligate 
life, and placed at the head of his table a young woman of 
considerable beauty, who went by the soubriquet of the 
Duchess of Gordon. But Gordon's extravagance knew no 
bounds and he was compelled to go into cheaper and more 



84 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

obscure lodgings. He was then at the service of any man 
who thought proper to send him an invitation to entertain 
his friends and to get very drunk by way of recompense. 
Dressed in a huge cocked hat and the tarnished uniform of a 
general or admiral (for Jemmy was not too proud to accept 
any article of apparel that occasionally was given him from 
an old clothes shop) . , . this extraordinary character infested 
the streets swearing and blaspheming in a most horrible 
manner." 

With the masters mere pensioners of Caius 
College, the scholars gone, and the school premises 
put to other and worse uses, it is not surprising to 
learn that the inhabitants of Cambridge were hardly 
aware of the existence of the benefaction of Stephen 
Perse. A strong and healthy public opinion would 
undoubtedly have made such ignorance impossible, 
and would not have tolerated such gross neglect of 
duty on the part of Masters and Trustees. Un- 
fortunately, this was an age of municipal mis- 
government and corruption, and in Cambridge, in 
particular, a proper sense of civic responsibility was 
entirely wanting. It almost appeared as if the Perse 
benefaction was destined to come to a dismal end. 
Fortunately, however, at an hour when the future 
prospects of the school seemed blackest, a single 
townsman started an agitation which saved the 
Perse from the oblivion threatening it. This 
agitator is known to us only by his pseudonym of 



DECLINE AND FALL 85 

** An Inhabitant of Cambridge." He started his 
campaign .in the Cambridge Chronicle on October 
20th, 1787, when he made the following enquiries : 

'* I should esteem it a favour if some of your correspondents 
would inform me, whether our Free Grammar School has 
an endowment, and to what amount ? who is the Master, and 
by whom appointed ? whose children are entitled to ad- 
mission at the School, and to whom should application be 
made for such admission ? " 

In the following issue of the paper an answer is 
given, quoting from Carter's History of Cambridge 
and the Founder's will. But the matter did not 
rest here. An Inhabitant's enquiries appear to have 
caused the Trustees considerable uneasinesss, and 
it was probably they who inspired the reply 
which appeared in the Chronicle of November 
1 7th following. 

" If your correspondent who signs himself ' An Inhabitant 
of Cambridge ' in your paper of the iQth of October had 
applied to the Master or Fellows of Caius College, he would 
have received a satisfactory answer to all his queries respect- 
ing the Free School founded by Dr. Perse. Though I am not 
a member of that society, yet I can assure your readers, from 
the best authority, that the School was kept open as long as 
any boys were sent for education ; that the masters now are 
and always have been ready to admit scholars agreeable to 
the Will of the Founder ; and that the parents of children 
properly qualified have only themselves to blame if they 
do not reap the advantages of that beneficent foundation. 

A Gownsman." 



86 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

" A Gownsman's " intrusion gave the matter the 
prominence it deserved, for it induced an old 
Persean to take up the cudgels on behalf of the 
parents, and he spoke out very plainly in a letter to 
the Chronicle a fortnight later. He undoubtedly 
gave the real cause for the closing of the Perse, and 
his genuine indignation at the treatment meted out 
to his old school may excuse faultiness in his English : 

" Had your correspondent (who signs himself ' A Gowns- 
man ') been as well acquainted as I am with the cause of 
the decHne of the Free School, he would never have asserted 
that the parents of children were to blame for neglect, not 
the Masters of the School. I have only to observe, when 
Dr. Perse founded the Free School in Cambridge, it is clear 
he intended that the Master and his Assistants should attend 
the whole of the usual school hours ; but boys attending 
hours before the Master came, and when he did come 
staying so short a time, reduced the School to so small a 
number, that the Master totally gave up attendance at 
School, and ordered the boys to his room in college. If 
but one boy, should not the Masters being paid their salaries 
fulfil the will of the donor ? ' The labourer is worthy of his 

*^"^^- One educated in the School." 

From a note appended to this letter we learn that 
the agitation thus started by " An Inhabitant " bore 
good fruit. The governors authorised the printer 
of the Chronicle to inform his readers that the school 
would be re-opened immediately after the Christmas 
holidays. 



CHAPTER VI 

- THE LAST DAYS OF THE ORIGINAL SCHEME 
(1787-1841) 

The Master to whom was entrusted the task of 
setting the affairs of the Perse in order was the 
namesake and son of the Charles Davy who had 
been Usher between 1747 and 1751. The younger 
Davy had been appointed to his father's old post in 
1785, and promoted to the Mastership a year later. 
For two years he had been content to follow the 
example of his predecessors and made no attempt 
to re-open the school. Nevertheless, when public 
opinion roused the Trustees to a proper sense of 
their responsibilities, he showed himself perfectly 
ready to carry out the duties attached to his post. 

The same cannot be said of his Usher, Robert 
Forby, who resigned ten days after the first disturb- 
ing enquiries were made in the Cambridge Chronicle. 
Forby was famous in his day as a botanist and the 
philologist of the East Anglian dialect. He also 

made a reputation for himself as a private tutor. 

87 



88 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

Throughout his Hfe he suffered from a slender 
purse and short temper. At a later period he once 
indulged in high words with the parent of one of his 
pupils, because that parent failed to understand that 
the obligation as between himself and his son's 
instructor " was perfectly mutual," and that tuition 
fees were not charitable doles. When Forby 
accepted a salaried post at the Perse School, there 
was created an obligation which was perfectly 
mutual. The acceptance of the salary without 
rendering any work in return made him the recipient 
of a charitable dole. Unfortunately for himself and 
for the school, Forby never realised this fact whilst 
he was Usher. 

The difficulty of finding an Usher ready to 
undertake the actual duty of teaching was, it would 
seem, by no means easily solved. George Leonard 
Jenyns held the post and received the emoluments 
during the period between October and December, 
1787. When the Trustees at length decided to 
re-open the school, he resigned. Fortunately, John 
Brinkley, his successor, proved more satisfactory. 
Brinkley was a distinguished mathematician, having 
only recently been Senior Wrangler and Smith's 
Prizeman. At the Perse he appears to have been 
conscientious in attending to his duties, but it was 
not to be expected that a man of his ability would be 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME 89 

content to hold for long a poorly paid subordinate 
post in a small grammar school. In 1791 he left 
Cambridge to become Professor of Astronomy at 
Dublin University and Astronomer Royal of 
Ireland. In 1826, he was consecrated Bishop of 
Clogher. 

When he re-opened the school, the younger Davy 
had one great advantage. He was in a position to 
strike out along new lines in education. His 
father's Letters to a Young Gentleman^ published 
in 1787, might almost have been a teacher's 
manual specially designed for use at the Perse, the 
" Young Gentleman " being the new Master him- 
self. As will be remembered, the Letters vigorously 
attacked the antiquated grammar school curriculum 
and advocated that greater attention should be paid 
in schools to the teaching of mathematics and 
science. The younger Davy was by inclination a 
scientist,^ and his Usher was an able mathematician. 
Nothing, therefore, could have been more gratifying 
to the two Masters than to introduce the teaching of 
new subjects. 

No reform, however, could be attended by any 
permanent success unless encouragement was 
received from the Trustees. Above all, financial 

^ Although in orders Davy took a degree in medicine. He took 
the Uving of Greeting, Suffolk, and died in 1836. 



90 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

support was very necessary. Unfortunately, no 
support — financial or otherwise — was forthcoming. 
Nothing in fact better showed the entire lack of 
interest on the part of the Trustees than the action 
taken by them at the very time the school was 
re-opened. The revenue of the Perse Trust had 
by this date fully recovered, and was, in fact, more 
than doubled. Consequently it had become neces- 
sary to revise the apportionment of this income. 
The most equitable division which the Trustees 
could have made would, of course, have been to 
make a proportionate increase to each of the special 
objects of the Founder's benefaction. This course, 
however, was not adopted by the Trustees. They 
took full advantage of the clause in the Founder's 
will which empowered them to bestow any surplus 
income on such charitable objects as they in their 
discretion thought fit. The object which com- 
mended itself to their charity was their own 
college. The members of Caius College (includ- 
ing officers to whom Perse had left nothing in 
his will) were the only persons to benefit under 
the re-distribution. In spite of the fact that 
nearly one quarter of the original income of the 
Trust had been allotted to the school, not one 
penny was added to the stipends of the Master or 
Usher. 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME 91 

As they received no encouragement of any 
descriptionj it is not surprising to learn that both 
Davy and Brinkley resigned at the end of three 
years. The school they left behind was poorly 
attended and insignificant. Nevertheless, the value 
of their work must not be gauged by the numbers 
or successes of their pupils. Had it not been for 
their care in these early days the school might once 
more have succumbed to neglect, for the Trustees' 
apathy was to continue for many years to come. 

Davy's successor, John Drew Borton, held office 
for two years only and was succeeded by his Usher, 
John Spencer Cobbold (Master, 1793-94). This 
latter had graduated as a high wrangler, and had 
also been Norrisian Prizeman. During the twelve 
months he was at the Perse, he proved himself 
a capable teacher. One of his pupils showed 
sufficient ability to obtain a scholarship at Caius — 
the first Persean to proceed there for over one 
hundred years. Unfortunately, in the case of 
Cobbold the Perse suffered the fate which so often 
befalls a poorly endowed school. It served an able 
man as the stepping stone to further advancement. 
In 1794 he was appointed to the more lucrative 
headmastership of Nuneaton School, and left to 
take up his duties there. 

After Cobbold's departure masters followed each 



92 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

other in quick succession.^ The Trustees reverted 
to the old practice of appointing junior fellows of 
their college. The inevitable result followed. The 
school dwindled almost to vanishing point, and no 
more boys proceeded to the University. In the 
greater w^orld beyond Cambridge the Napoleonic 
wars were being waged. As an indication of how 
inadequately the school was fulfilling its functions 
in national life, it must regretfully be placed on 
record that the Perse cannot claim as its own a 
single member of the British forces then in the field.^ 
In 1804 an improved rent roll once more enabled 
the Trustees to make a fresh distribution of the 
funds in their hands. It is satisfactory to note that 
on this occasion the claims of the school were not 
wholly overlooked. The Master's stipend was 
raised to ;f 53 los., and that of the Usher to ^^31 los. 
Yet in view of the greatly increased cost of living this 
further remuneration was quite inadequate. It was 
not as if the Trustees were unable to make a more 



1 The following were Masters of the Perse between 1794 and 181 2 : 
St. John Smith (1794-95), Benedict Chapman (1795-99), George 
Grigby (1799- 1802), William Gimingham (1802-04), William Wilkins 
(1804-05), Daniel Gwilt (1805-10), and John White (1810-12). They 
were all Fellows of Caius. 

* George Grigby, who had been Master from 1799 to 1802, served 
in the First Dragoons and Eleventh Foot, rising to the rank of 
Captain. He was drowned off Falmouth in 181 1 when proceeding 
in a troopship to the Peninsula. 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME 93 

substantial increase, for the other beneficiaries under 
the Founder's will obtained proportionately far 
larger sums under this second redistribution. If 
the Trustees really expected the school's fortunes to 
revive after this additional grant, they were dis- 
appointed. Even with this increase in their salaries, 
the Masters did not receive a living wage. Con- 
sequently, it was impossible for them to devote their 
full time to the school. Writing in his Cantabrigia 
Depicta Harraden gives a melancholy account of the 
state of the school in 1 809 : 

" The school-house exists almost without scholars : the 
insufficiency of the salaries prevents a constant attendance 
of the masters, and therefore few boys attend — and those 
receive their lessons very frequently at their master's 
lodgings." 

The New Cambridge Guide (published in the same 
year) provides further details and accounts for the 
decline of the Perse in very plain language : 

" By some mismanagement the original intention of this 
excellent institution is perverted : as two or three scholars 
is generally the largest number at present educated, and 
these receive their lessons at the lodgings of the master. 
This abuse is the more to be regretted, as the children, 
generally speaking, of the poor inhabitants of Cambridge 
are rude and uninformed." 

Three years after these words were penned, the 
Trustees came to the conclusion that the state of 



94 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

affairs described in these two books hardly reflected 
credit upon themselves. They saw that the curri- 
culum provided was out of date, and empowered the 
Master to revise it. They also realised that fifty 
odd pounds was not an adequate salary for the Master 
and raised it to ^iio. To provide money for this 
increased stipend they abolished the post of Usher. 
At the same time they reduced the number of places 
on the foundation to sixteen — a reduction which 
inflicted hardship on nobody, if three was generally 
the largest number of boys attending the school. 
The governors also empowered the headmaster to 
take non-foundationers into the school and charge 
an entrance fee of one guinea, and also a guinea a 
quarter for instructing them, " to say nothing," in 
the words of a hostile critic of these changes, " of 
a miserable exaction of 2s. 6d. per annum for candle 
and firing." As earnest of their changed attitude 
towards the school, they took advantage of the 
resignation of John White, then Master, to break 
away from the harmful tradition of the past, and 
appoint a man who was not a member of Caius. 
Their choice fell on John Wilson, formerly chaplain 
of Trinity. They insisted on his residing in the 
school premises, and assigned both masters' houses 
to him. 

The townspeople of Cambridge received a printed 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME 95 

circular informing them of these changes, and the 
resulting benefits which it was hoped the school 
would derive therefrom. Unfortunately — but at 
the same time perhaps inevitably — the inhabitants 
of Cambridge received the information with marked 
coldness. To them the chief recommendation of the 
Perse had been the gratuitous education which it 
provided for an almost unlimited number of boys. 
If payment was now to be demanded they could 
point to several private schools in and near Cam- 
bridge which could provide a much better education 
at the same cost. Furthermore, they saw that in 
the absence of an Usher, the Master would be 
hampered if he had to manage many more boys than 
sixteen. Local hostility was so pronounced that 
the scheme appeared to be almost foredoomed to 
complete failure. Very shortly afterwards the Trus- 
tees wisely rescinded the most obnoxious of all the 
new regulations — that empowering the Master to 
charge non-foundationers. 

It would have required a man of considerable 
character to surmount the difficulties which impeded 
the growth of the school. Unfortunately Wilson's 
talents were distinctly mediocre. During the thirteen 
years in which he was Master, only one boy is known 
to have proceeded from the Perse to the Univer- 
sity. The number of boys attending the school 



96 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

remained practically stationary at sixteen. The 
Trustees themselves were keenly disappointed with 
the results achieved by their reforms. What with the 
cold water poured by the townspeople on their well- 
meant scheme and the inefficiency of the Master, 
it seemed hopeless to restore the bygone prestige 
of the Perse. Instead of setting to work to try to 
popularise the new scheme or to find a more satis- 
factory Master, the governors once more became 
apathetic. At the time the Trust enjoyed a very 
large surplus income, which might well have been 
devoted to the improvement of the school. Such 
an idea never suggested itself to the governors. 
Strewed up and down the accounts we find such 
items as, " A sufferer by fire at Chesterton, /^i," 
and " to Mrs. Wilson's sister, Iji " — excellent 
objects of charity, no doubt, but not those which 
the Founder intended to benefit. Certainly the ten 
pounds bestowed in 1 8 1 7 as a " Donation to Charity 
Schools," could have been more profitably and 
properly spent nearer home. 

As the number of boys attending the Perse never 
reached a score, the very limited premises in Free 
School Lane were more than adequate for Wilson's 
requirements. In 1 8 1 6 this fact came to the notice 
of the University, which, at the beginning of that 
year, had under the will of Viscount Fitzwilliam 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME 97 

received a handsome bequest of pictures as well as 
a sum of ^lOOjOOO to build a museum to house the 
collection. Until the museum could be built the 
pictures required a resting place, and a syndicate 
was appointed to consider the question of temporary 
accommodation. On April 27th, 18 16, three 
members of this syndicate came to inspect the 
school buildings. They were received by Wilson, 
who showed them over the premises, including the 
schoolroom. He informed the gentlemen that he 
did ** not make much use of this room except during 
the hot weather.'* Having made a careful inspec- 
tion the members of the syndicate came to the 
conclusion that after certain structural alterations 
had been made, the room would be well adapted for 
housing the Fitzwilliam collection. The Trustees 
made no difficulty about acceding to their applica- 
tion, and even agreed to allow the University the 
use of the northern wing of the buildings when 
they asked for it. All they stipulated was that the 
syndics should provide at their own expense a new 
room and offices for the Master, and should also 
bear the cost of restoring the building to its former 
state on the expiration of their tenancy. Accord- 
ingly by the end of June, 1 8 1 6, Master and boys 
migrated from the schoolhouse to the premises in 
the south wing. The school was destined never to 



P.S. 



98 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

return to its original home. When the Fitzwilliam 
syndicate surrendered the premises in 1842, the 
building was pulled down and a new one erected in 
its place. 

A contemporary print shows the interior of the 
old school as it was when it housed the Fitzwilliam 
collection. As this is the only view of the interior 
we have, and as the Fitzwilliam syndics made con- 
siderable structural alterations, a few words of 
description will not be out of place. The room as 
depicted is serving the twofold purpose of a picture 
gallery and a museum. The original windows were 
concealed behind the wainscot bookcases lining the 
walls, and in their place skylights were contrived 
in the open roof. The room itself was lengthened 
by the syndics by taking in a portion of the Usher's 
house on the north side. To obtain a better effect 
the syndics removed the upper floor and partitions 
of this portion of the buildings. The architect 
responsible for these alterations was William 
Wilkins, who had been Master from 1 804 to 1 806 — 
an absolutely blank period in the school's history. 
In 1816 he was called upon to complete the wreck 
of that which, with a little effort, he might ten years 
before have piloted to safety. 

There is nothing to record of the last nine years 
of Wilson's rule. The school remained in exile 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME 99 

and obscurity until his resignation in 1825. Al- 
though this first experiment of appointing a Master 
from another college than Caius failed, the Trustees 
fortunately did not consider that failure afforded an 
excuse for reverting to their old custom. As in 
18 12, they went to Trinity for their Master. On 
this occasion their choice fell on James Bailey. 
Their new Master was one of the most brilliant 
of all the classical scholars who have had charge of 
the Perse. In his undergraduate days Bailey won the 
Browne Medals for Greek Ode and Greek Epigram, 
as well as the Members' Latin Essay Prize. His 
work at that period brought him to the notice of 
Sir Walter Scott, who not only endeavoured to 
obtain a librarianship in Edinburgh for him, but 
also gave the struggling student financial assistance.* 
Throughout his life, Bailey was a frequent writer for 
the Classical Journal. Perhaps his best known con- 
tribution to classical study is his edition of Fac- 
ciolati's Latin Dictionary, which he published whilst 
he was at the Perse. Another work produced by 
him during this period of headmastership was an 
annotated edition of Dalzel's Analecta Graeca 
Minora. He was, moreover, something more than 
a scholar. He could inspire in others a warm 

1 Letters from Scott to Bailey ar§ ROW tO be seen in the Fitzwilliam 

Museum. 



loo HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

enthusiasm for his favourite studies. His pupils 
always spoke of him with affection and esteem. 
Into many he inculcated a deep love of classical 
learning and a true spirit of poetry. Some of his 
boys did their Master infinite credit in later life. 
Considering the smallness of the school the number 
of boys he sent to the University was quite remark- 
able, five of them becoming Fellows of their respec- 
tive colleges. 

One of the first steps taken by Bailey was to 
remove the impression that the school was intended 
exclusively for the benefit of the sixteen founda- 
tioners. For this purpose he caused a notice to 
be circulated to the following effect : 

" The stipends specified in the will of Dr. Perse appearing 
to the Trustees to be an inadequate remuneration for the 
education of one hundred scholars, it has been agreed by 
them to reduce the number of free scholars to sixteen. The 
School has of late been considerably improved : it having 
been deemed advisable by the present headmaster, that, exclu- 
sively of a knowledge of the Greek and Latin languages, and 
of Greek, Latin, and English composition (for which only the 
original institution provided), the scholars should likewise be 
instructed in the ordinary branches of education, together 
with the elements of mathematics." 

Though, not unnaturally, there was considerable 
feeling locally over the continued reduction in the 
number of free places, the prospect of obtaining a 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME loi 

sound education along modern lines restored con- 
fidence in the Perse. Bailey's undoubted ability 
proved that this confidence was not mistaken, and 
the numbers attending the school rose rapidly. 
From sixteen they quickly mounted to thirty : 
before Bailey left they were over fifty. The dis- 
tinctions gained by many of his pupils mark Bailey's 
Mastership as one of the most successful epochs in 
the history of the school. The class list for mid- 
summer 1837 is interesting reading. There were 
twelve boys in the top class, and of these no less than 
eight proceeded to the University, seven graduating 
in honours. 

In addition to day boys, the headmaster took in a 
few boarders from outside Cambridge. In 1827 
he had to obtain assistance. He called in a member 
of his own college, Francis Reveley. The Trustees' 
account books contain no record of the payment of 
a regular stipend to Reveley or to any other assistant. 
Bailey must therefore have provided the Usher's 
salary out of his own pocket. Unfortunately, this 
outgoing tended rather to hamper the school's 
progress. Although he was treated by the Trustees 
with far greater liberality than Wilson, Bailey was 
never free from financial embarrassment. Constant 
illness and general inability to understand monetary 
matters kept him in continual straits. Although 



I02 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

his salary rose gradually from ^12^ to ^^450, he )yas 

frequently in debt, and on one occasion had to 

obtain a loan from the Trustees, which he never 

succeeded in repaying. In the end he was obliged 

to compound with his creditors. His financial 

troubles were, however, by no means so dire as 

those of Reveley. The unfortunate Usher had to 

subsist on the pittance Bailey could afford to pay 

him. He, too, got into debt, and his creditors 

were far more insistent in their demands. He 

had the debtor's jail constantly before his eyes, 

and on one occasion only escaped incarceration 

through the timely intervention of the Master 

of Caius. 

Some interesting reminiscences of the Perse as it 

was in the thirties were recorded in the school 

magazine of April, 1905. They are those of the 

late Mr. D. V. Mordecai, who was at the school 

from 1834 to 1840. 

" Mr. Mordecai was a Foundation Scholar, as indeed 
were all the boys. The way in which he was elected compares 
curiously with the present system. Being then about nine 
years old, he went with his father to see Mr. Bailey (then 
Headmaster) at his house next the School, and was told to 
read a chapter in the Bible. After reading about half-a- 
dozen verses, Mr. Bailey said, ' That's quite sufficient, I'll 
pass you,' and his father was forthwith instructed to get 
him a Latin Grammar of Mr. Hall (the grandfather of the 
present bookseller). His formal appointment as scholar 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME 103 

was made by Dr. Davy (then Master of Caius College, in 
whose hands the government of the School was at that 
time), and it was Mr. Turnbull, a Fellow of Caius, who gave 
him his recommendation. The Foundation Scholarship 
carried with it the right to free rooms and lectures, if the 
boy reached the top of the School and entered Caius College, 
and the estimated cost of the College education was not 
more than £90 for the three years. . . . 

" After mastering a certain amount of Latin Grammar, 
learning much of it by heart, Mr. Mordecai went on to 
the Electa, a book of short Latin pieces. Then came the 
Delectus, Eutropius, Cornelius Nepos and Ovid in the order 
named. At this point he began Greek, having then learned 
little but the alphabet. When he had done some Elementary 
Grammar, he started the Gospel of S. John in Greek. The 
next classical author was Virgil, and at this point the Classical 
studies of those who were not going to the first class stopped. 
There were six classes (Class I. being the head), and Mr. 
Mordecai was top of the second class when he left. Boys 
were allowed one month after leaving, during which they 
might return to the School if they or their parents altered 
their minds. Mr. Mordecai's month was extended to two, 
because (as we may safely conjecture) they were unwilling 
to lose so promising a pupil. 

" In Mathematics the boys were taught Arithmetic, 
Algebra, Euclid, Trigonometry, and Conic Sections. They 
learnt practically no English Grammar, and very little 
Geography. One afternoon in each week was devoted to 
English History and one to Roman History. Once a week 
they read from the Bible and learnt the Creed, the Ten 
Commandments, and so on, and sometimes read (say) 
some of the poems of Cowper or Cottle (for further information 
as to whom I refer my readers to the Dictionary of National 
Biography). For home work they never had more than 



I04 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

twenty lines of (say) Ovid or Virgil, and about half-a-dozen 
verses in the Greek Testament, 

" The School hours were from 9 to 12 and 2 to 4, with 
half-holidays on Wednesdays and Saturdays and a whole 
day's holiday on the more important Church Festivals. 
For holidays they had a fortnight at Easter, five weeks at 
Midsummer, a fortnight at Stourbridge Fair time and five 
weeks at Christmas. 

" The masters did not wear gowns during school hours. 
The boys sat at long desks, which were furnished with 
inkwells, and lockers covered by flaps." 

Bailey appears to have taken charge of part of 

the mathematical as well as the classical teaching. 

He did not find himself interfered with by intruding 

governors, but was left to manage the school very 

much as he liked. The first governor to take any 

active interest in the school was Dr. Benedict 

Chapman, who had been Master from 1796 to 1799. 

Shortly after his election to the Mastership of Caius 

in 1839, Chapman paid a visit to the school. Mr. 

Mordecai remembered 

" his going round the School in his black knee breeches and 
gaiters, and Mr. Barber's suggesting that a bolt should be 
put on the gate and that a boy should be appointed to lock 
it at 9 o'clock in order that the evil habits of the unpunctual 
might be more patently advertised. Mr. Barber suggested 
Mr. Mordecai, and Dr. Chapman appointed him." 

Even to the schoolboy mind this reform would 
appear but trivial. But what was it that brought 
so important a personage as the Master of Caius to 



LAST DAYS OF ORIGINAL SCHEME 105 

see the school, whose existence so many of his pre- 
decessors had ignored ? His presence was due to 
an agitation for reforms of far greater magnitude — 
reforms which when achieved were to confer great 
benefits on the Perse. But the events leading up to 
and resulting from this agitation require a whole 
chapter to themselves. 



CHAPTER VII 

FROM ONE REFORM MOVEMENT TO ANOTHER 
(1833-73) 

It must not be supposed that during all the years of 

neglect the word " reform " was never mentioned in 

connection with the Perse Trust. Other objects of 

the Founder's benefaction had suffered in the same 

manner as the school. Whereas the Master and four 

senior Fellows of Caius had between 18 12 and 1830 

raised their own stipends from the original ;^9 

per annum ordained by the Founder to £^^0 per 

annum, the Perse Fellows at the same college had 

still to subsist on the pittances given to them under 

the Founder's will. This, however, could not go 

long without comment. In 1830 two of the Perse 

Fellows, H. O. Martin and Daniel Maude, made a 

strong remonstrance against the prevailing practice 

and demanded that the Perse scholars and Fellows 

should also receive an augmentation of their salaries. 

This remonstrance led to an examination into the 

history and administration of the trust. 

106 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 107 

In consequence of the resulting disclosures, 
Henry Bickersteth (better known at a later date as 
Lord Langdale and Master of the Rolls), who was 
then one of the four senior Fellows, ** felt so con- 
vinced that he had improperly (but unwittingly, for 
he did not reside here) received sums intended for 
other uses, that he voluntarily refunded a sum of 
nearly £800, and he then, or soon afterwards, gave 
up his fellowship." An interesting commentary to 
this very honourable action of Mr. Bickersteth is to 
be found in the conduct of the recipients of this 
/^8oo. ** The sum returned," we are told, " was 
carried regularly to account merely as ' Received of 
Mr. Bickersteth ' 1 ! ! ! and though, in consequence 
of the increase in the stipends of the Perse Fellows, 
the Master and four Seniors were obliged to reduce 
their salaries in the course of that year, yet no other 
effect seems to have been produced by Mr, Bicker- 
steth's honourable and manly conduct." 

Beyond the precincts of Caius there was an 
increasing feeling of dissatisfaction as to the way in 
which the Trust was being administered. As has 
been seen, the voice of dissatisfaction was first 
heard amongst the townspeople in 18 12, when it 
was suggested to impose a quarterly tuition fee. 
But in those days, with a corrupt and inefficient 
Corporation governing the borough, there was no 



io8 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

organisation in the town which could reasonably 
hope to conduct a successful agitation for reforma- 
tion in the management of the Perse School. By 
1833, however, all this was changed. The old 
municipal Corporation was on its last legs, and reform 
in every walk of civic life was the political battle-cry 
of the hour. By now the agitators for reform in the 
school were an organised body, and spoke with no 
uncertain voice. 

The reform party seem to have made representa- 
tions to the governors, and to have requested them 
to draw up a plan for a more equitable distribution 
of the trust funds, the appointment of a regular 
Usher, and the increase in the number of free places 
to one hundred. Apparently the reply received did 
not give satisfaction. A public meeting was called 
to protest against the manner in which the school 
was being managed. As a result of this meeting, it 
was decided to proceed by way of information 
against the Trustees. Accordingly, in 1833, an 
information was filed against them at the relation of 
Jeremiah Thring, William Reeves, and William 
Metcalfe. The relators prayed for an account of 
the property applicable for the purposes of the 
charity as declared in the Wills of the Founder and 
Griffith, and more particularly for an account of that 
property applicable for the purposes of the school. 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 109 

After asking for a declaration that the rents of the 
Free School Lane property belonged exclusively to 
the school, the relators went on to demand that the 
Master and four senior Fellows and Bailey (who 
was also made a defendant) should be made per- 
sonally answerable for any part of the income which 
the Court should find to have been misapplied by 
them. In particular, it was asked that the Master 
of Caius (Dr. Davy) and Dr. Woodhouse (the 
senior Fellow),^ should be ordered to refund all the 
monies they had wrongly received under the various 
schemes of redistribution since 1804. Finally, the 
relators prayed that the Master and four senior 
Fellows might be deprived of all control of the 
school. 

Soon after the proceedings were instituted a 
pamphlet was printed, which gives much interesting 
information as to the evidence upon which the 
relators relied. The pamphlet takes the form of an 
open letter from a pseudonymous Lancelot Probe to 
a pseudonymous Gamaliel Thorn. It is rather sur- 
prising to find statements of this character appearing 
in print at a time when the suit was still pending, but 
it is still more surprising to learn of the methods 
employed to obtain the evidence for which the 
writer sought : 

1 He was Usher of the Perse from 1806 to 1812. 



no HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

" My dear Thorn," writes Probe, " I no sooner received 
your note respecting Perse's Free School, than I sent for 
our worthy Httle friend Simpkins, and by his interference 
I succeeded, though with some difficulty, in procuring the 
loan for a short time of the papers, from which I have 
extracted the following information ; upon the accuracy of 
which, I assure you his lordship [sc, the judge] may implicitly 
rely." 

Comment is almost superfluous. It was only a most 
extraordinary method of eliciting information from 
an opponent in a lawsuit. 

Howbeit, at this date we have no need to discuss 
the ethics of the transaction. What we have to 
consider is the evidence, which Probe, with the co- 
operation of Simpkins, was able to obtain. They 
certainly made a very exhaustive search of the 
documents they were thus able to borrow, and some 
of the facts published to the world in the open letter 
are of very material interest. Some of these facts 
have already been referred to in this book, but for 
the purpose of making clear the exact manner in 
which the trust funds had been dealt with, I think 
it will not be amiss to repeat them here and to add 
certain additional facts, which Lancelot Probe 
brought to light. 

The bulk of the letter deals with the application 
of the income of the Trust. Probe points out that 
this income had risen from ^^250 per annum at the 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 1 1 1 



time of Perse's death to roughly £2000 per annum 
in 1829. 

" You are of course aware," he goes on to say, " that on 
general principles the objects of the charitable trusts ought 
to receive any benefit which may arise from the increase, or 
suffer any loss from the decrease, of the trust proportionably. 
In order to show how proportion has been violated in this 
case, I beg your attention to the following account of the 
expenditure for the year 1829, which it will be curious to 
compare with the statement before given from Dr. Perse's 
will." 

For clearness and convenience' sake the two 
statements referred to are subjoined in tabular 
form : 



Free School 
Master 
Usher 

Almshouses - 

Caius College — 
Master 

Four Senior Fel- 
lows 
Perse and Frank-" 
land Fellows , 
Perse Scholars - 
College Chest and 
other College 
Officers - 

Town of Cambridge 
New River and 
Barnwell Cause- 
way - 

Anniversary - 

Poor of Massing-^ 
ham, Marpley, 1- 
and Barley J 



Under the Founder's Will. In 1829. 

I s. d. 

40 o o 150 

20 o o 60 o o o 



300 

600 
78 o o 
24 o o 

17 II 4 



Total 



i 


s. 


d. 


60 








24 








128 


II 


4 


18 








5 


3 


4 


6 








243 


14 


8 



560 
390 
144 

298 



s. d. 


I s 


. d. 












150 







120 




































1672 















16 


9 




6 





Total 


1967 


9 



112 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

From the above statistics Probe made the 
following deductions : 

" Taking the increase to be one-eighth of the original 
endowment, the following will be a statement of the profit 
and loss of a few of the principal objects of the charity in 
the year referred to (in other words, the sums which some 
were overpaid and the others underpaid). 

Profit. Loss. 

I s. d. i s. d. 

Master of Caius Coll. 256 o o Free School - - 330 o o 

Four senior Fellows - 512 o o Perse and Frankland 

College Chest, etc. - 91 9 4 Fellows - - 230 o o 

859 9 4 560 o o 



" The coolness with which the Master and four seniors 
(themselves the trustees) raised their own stipends from £9 
to £840 per annum, must excite in the breasts of the old 
Corporators [sc. of Cambridge] a conscious sense of their 
inferiority in the practice of that charity which begins 
at home. . . . 

" Dr. Perse in his will gave nothing whatever to the Deans, 
the Steward, the Conduct, the College Registrar, or the 
Gardener ; but his faithful trustees have no scruple in 
extending to these meritorious personages the benefit of his 
munificence, and in 1799 the sum of £800 was paid out of 
the trust fund towards the sum expended by the college in 
repairs and new buildings, and in a contribution to govern- 
ment for the internal defence of the country 1 ! ! " 

The most serious of all Probe's allegations are 
those made with reference to the manner in 
which the accounts were kept. They are repeated 
here for what they are worth, although without 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 113 

impeaching his veracity a search in the trust 
account books has not confirmed the first charge 
brought against the bursar. After referring to 
the Founder's directions as to the auditing of the 
accounts, the letter goes on to say that these audits 
have 

" never been done within memory, and the accounts (kept 
infinitely worse than churchwardens' or constables' accounts 
are usually kept in country villages), are audited by the 
Trustees themselves : — with what care will appear from 
these facts. In one year the Bursar made a mistake {of 
course in his own favour) of £iOO in adding up the account, 
and this mistake, palpable as it is, has never yet been rectified, 
and in more modern times a mistake of more than £iOO in 
the Bursar's favour was not discovered until the second 
audit afterwards. On another occasion, a tax of about £25 
was suffered to creep into the account, although it was 
imposed on property with which the Trust had nothing 
whatever to do." 

Reverting to the school itself Probe complains of 
the reduction of the number of the free scholars, the 
abolition of the post of Usher, the handing over of 
the school premises to the Fitzwilliam Museum, and 
the imposition of school fees.^ 

Although this open letter did not constitute the 

1 The pamphlet from which the above statements are taken is 
entitled A Letter to the Burgesses of Cambridge on the approaching 
municipal elections. By Gamaliel Thorn, Esq. With an appendix 
relative to the Perse Free School, Cambridge : printed at Cambridge, 
1835- 

P.S. H 



114 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

pleadings of the relators,^ it gives in greater detail 
the substance of their charges. The defendants' 
pleadings have not been traced by me, but they 
appear to have consisted in a more or less categorical 
denial of the charges brought against them, and a 
strong rebuttal of the imputation of bad faith in 
their dealings with the trust funds. 

The law is proverbially slow, and the case in 
question proved no exception to the rule. The 
defendants petitioned to have the action dismissed 
as vexatious, but failed in their attempt. Finally, 
the action came on for trial in the Rolls Court in 
April, 1837. It is interesting to note that the 
presiding judge was Henry Bickersteth, then Lord 
Langdale. The hearing before him occupied three 
days. No very determined defence was offered. 
The Master and Fellows at the Bar admitted that 
there had been irregularities in the administration 
of the trust funds. In extenuation they pleaded 
that their attention had never been seriously drawn 
to the subject until about 1830, and that then they 
had done their best to remedy past errors. They 
now were prepared to offer every facility for 
reorganising the trust. As a defence against the 

^ The pleadings in this case have not yet been discovered. They 
have been wrongly filed at the Record Office. It is to be hoped 
that some subsequent historian of the School will be more successful 
in his search for them. 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 115 

charge of misapplication of the trust funds they relied 
on their own particular interpretation of the clause 
in Perse's will directing the surplus income of the 
charity to be " from time to time bestowed as my 
Executors for their times, and after my Supervisors, 
shall think fit." 

Lord Langdale delivered judgment on July 31st, 
1837. He pointed out that the difficulty as to the 
true construction of the Founder's will arose from 
the fact that Perse conceived of his charity only as 
receiving a permanently fixed annual income, 
whereas that income had proved to be a very varying 
sum of money. With regard to the clause dealing 
with surplus income, he held that no beneficial 
gift was thereby made to Caius College, but that 
the clause was a specific direction to bestow such 
money upon charitable uses. Lord Langdale went 
on to declare that the principal object of Dr. Perse's 
benefaction was without doubt the school, and that 
it was clearly to the school that the greater portion 
of the trust income should be devoted. He had 
been asked to remove the Master and Fellows of 
Caius from their trusteeship : that, he felt, he could 
not possibly do. " When I see how anxiously the 
Founder in this case had connected his foundation 
with the college and the utter impossibility of 
separating the one from the other without defeating 



ii6 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

his plain and manifest intention, I conceive it to be 
perfectly clear that the college cannot be removed 
from the office of trustees." Neither could he see 
his way to order the Master and Dr. Woodhouse 
to refund the moneys they had received, as they had 
participated in the division of the trust moneys with 
persons, who were equally culpable, but who were 
then dead, and therefore not before the Court. 

Lord Langdale further declared that the sum of 
/^loo was subject to the trusts of the will of George 
Griffith, and that the school buildings and the adjoin- 
ing house in Free School Lane belonged exclusively 
to the school. He referred it to a Master in 
Chancery to approve of a scheme for the general 
administration of the property and to settle a scheme 
for the future conduct and management of the 
school. In settling such scheme the Master was to 
be at liberty to approve of a plan for adding instruc- 
tion in writing and arithmetic to the curriculum 
prescribed by the Founder. 

Another four years passed before the new pro- 
posals for administering the trust received judicial 
sanction. On July 31st, 1841, Sir Giffin Wilson, 
the Master to whom the cause had been referred, 
gave his approval to a revised scheme. In the first 
place, the Master assented to a proposal for rebuild- 
ing the school premises, and directed that a sum of 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 117 

£2600 should be set aside out of the trust funds for 
that purpose. The minimum salary attached to 
the headmastership was fixed at ;^300, and that 
attached to the post of Usher at ;£i 50. 

The rules prescribed for the conduct and manage- 
ment of the school kept as nearly as possible both to 
the letter and the spirit of the Founder's will and the 
ordinances made by his Executors in 162 1. It is 
pleasing to see the old regulation which ordered a 
decent oaken board to be hung up in the school with 
the scholars' names inscribed thereon, repeated word 
for word. The Usher was still required to keep a 
register of admissions, and produce it to the Perse 
Registrar for transcription. Preference was still to 
be accorded to boys educated at the school in appoint- 
ment to scholarships and fellowships on the Perse 
foundation at Caius, and to the posts of Master and 
Usher of the school. 

Here and there, however, alterations had to be 
made to adapt the school to modern requirements. 
The number of free scholars remained at one 
hundred — to be drawn from Cambridge and the 
three adjacent villages, but the new rules went into 
more detail with regard to the mode of choosing 
them. Elections to vacancies were to be held four 
times a year. The Perse Registrar was to give at 
least seven days* warning of the meetings to be held 



ii8 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

to make such elections, by inserting a notice to that 
effect in one or more of the local newspapers and by 
posting a similar notice outside the school door. 
Scholars were to be between ten and fourteen years 
old at the time of their election, and were not to 
remain longer than the midsummer vacation after 
they should attain the age of eighteen. Morning 
school was to begin at nine and last till twelve ; 
afternoon school was to begin at two and last till 
five. The new scheme also ordained early morning 
school in summer time, which was to begin at seven 
and last for an hour, but this rule very speedily fell 
into abeyance. Saturday was to be a half-holiday, 
and the Master was empowered to grant at his 
discretion eight whole holidays and twelve other 
half-holidays during the year. December 14th, 
being the day now fixed for celebrating the Founder's 
obit, was to be a whole holiday. 

The Master was permitted to take in paying 
scholars provided he took " such further sufficient 
help " besides his regular staff as the Trustees 
should think fit. These non-foundationers paid an 
entrance fee of ;^5 and a half-yearly fee of ;^i, which 
fees were to be divided between the headmaster and 
Usher. To provide for an additional master, who 
was to be called the Assistant Usher, the governors 
were empowered to charge free scholars an entrance 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 119 

fee of thirty shillings and a half-yearly fee of ten 
shillings. 

The vacations were to be five weeks at Christmas 
commencing on December 19th, ten days at Easter 
commencing the day before Good Friday, and five 
weeks at Midsummer commencing on June i8th. 
Within one week of the Midsummer holidays the 
free scholars were to be examined ** as to their 
proficiency in classical and mathematical learning " 
by two persons of the standing of M.A., appointed 
by the Trustees. The examiners were to class the 
boys according to merit and award prizes on the 
examination. 

Before dealing with the history of the school 
under this new scheme, it will be necessary to go 
back a few years and give an account of the events 
happening in the school whilst the suit in Chancery 
was pending. After the information was filed, the 
Trustees endeavoured to set the school's affairs in 
better order. In 1833 they appointed a regular 
Usher and made him an allowance in lieu of a house, 
his proper residence being still in the hands of the 
Fitzwilliam syndics. At Lady Day in the same 
year Bailey resigned. His health had not been good 
for some time past, and he had been absent from 
school most of the previous autumn. He appears 
to have been worried amongst other things by the 



I20 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

Chancery suit, in which it will be remembered he 
was a defendant, and his medical advisers strongly 
recommended him to give up his work. The 
Trustees recognised his services to the school in a 
very generous manner by granting him a pension. 
It is gratifying to note that the Court of Chancery 
subsequently confirmed this grant, and at the same 
time refused to make any order as to costs against 
Bailey. The work he did for the Perse merited 
better treatment than proceedings in Chancery, and 
it was well that he was compensated for the worries 
and anxieties of the lawsuit by appreciation in such 
a tangible form. Bailey left Cambridge for London, 
where he appears to have supplemented his pension 
by writing for the Classical and other journals, but 
his latter days were not entirely free from financial 
trouble. However, a Civil List Pension, awarded 
in recognition of his services to classical study, helped 
to alleviate the anxieties of his declining years. 

The governors did not at once appoint a suc- 
cessor to Bailey. They placed a newly elected 
Fellow of Caius in temporary charge of the school. 
This was Charles Clayton, who had formerly been 
one of Bailey's most successful pupils. Whilst at 
the University he was a Browne's Medallist on two 
occasions. Later in life he became well known as 
a popular college tutor, but perhaps he is best 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 121 

remembered in Cambridge as vicar of Holy Trinity, 
where he proved an able successor to Charles Simeon. 
He had charge of the Perse for a single year only, 
but subsequently as an examiner and a member of 
the governing body he took a warm interest in his 
old school. Not a few Perseans owed much of 
their success in after life to the kindly advice and 
encouragement he offered them whilst they were 
still schoolboys. 

In April, 1837, the governors chose Peter Mason 
of St. John's College as headmaster. He was a 
distinguished mathematician, having graduated third 
wrangler in the year in which Sir George Airy was 
senior. To Mason was entrusted the task of 
carrying the revised scheme into effect. For the 
first five years he taught in the southern wing of the 
school buildings, where Bailey had taught before 
him. In 1 842 the Fitzwilliam collection was moved 
out of the schoolhouse proper, and in pursuance of 
the order of the Court the whole of the buildings 
were rebuilt and enlarged. Mason and his Usher, 
the Rev. George Barber, were driven out of their 
houses for the time being, but the governors made 
them an allowance in lieu of residence. By 1 844 a 
new range of buildings was ready for the reception 
of Masters and boys. The architect, Mr. John 
Smith, retained the old quadrangle formation of the 



122 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

original buildings, and the old schoolroom with its 
fine Jacobean roof was preserved almost intact. 
The lighting of this room was improved by the 
insertion of large three-light windows with diamond 
shaped panes. An honours board was hung up on 
one of the walls of the room, but it was chiefly 
remarkable for its lacunae, for Jeremy Taylor's 
successes were immediately followed by those of 
the late locum tenens, Charles Clayton. Another 
embellishment was " a splendid globe three feet in 
diameter, and weighing three stone, suspended for 
convenience from the roof," which evoked the 
admiration of a contemporary guidebook. The two 
masters' houses, lying on either side of the school- 
room, were rebuilt on a more commodious scale. 

The number of pupils had to be strictly Hmited 
until these buildings were ready for the full hundred 
boys. At the end of 1844 Mason had hardly as 
many as twenty boys to teach, but as soon as the new 
premises were opened the numbers rose instan- 
taneously to one hundred. At the same time an 
Assistant Usher, the Rev. E. W. Gilbert, appeared on 
the scene. The school was divided into six classes, 
of which the first was the highest. Every boy was 
placed in the sixth or lowest class on joining the 
school. The Master took this class and the first, 
and was thus able to make the acquaintance and 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 123 

gauge the calibre of each newcomer. Mr. Barber 
took the second and third classes, and Mr. Gilbert 
the fourth and fifth. Greek, Latin, and Arithmetic 
were the subjects taught in the lower classes. 
Homer, Xenophon, Anacreon and Virgil were read 
in the first class : the second learnt Ovid and the 
Greek Testament : in the fourth the boys used the 
Eton Grammar, Valpy's Syntax and Prosody and a 
book entitled Propria qu<£ maribus. None of the 
Masters were classical scholars and so the educa- 
tion in this subject was not so efficient as perhaps 
it ought to have been. At this period the Perse 
might almost be called an exclusively mathematical 
school. Not only did classics fall far behind the 
standard attained in many other schools of the same 
size, but general English subjects were almost 
totally neglected. The second class was supposed 
to read Goldsmith's Geography, but a scholar of this 
period informs us : 

" Of English the utmost search of calls of memory reveals 
only some Geography with Mr. Gilbert in some lower class, 
and some Shakespeare read round boy by boy without 
pause for comment or explanation in the first form. Of 
modern languages or science, music or drawing, there was 
nothing whatever in connection with the school." 

The books in use for religious instruction were 
Watts' Scripture History and Pinnock's Catechism. 



124 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

Peter Mason was more fortunate than his pre- 
decessors in that he succeeded in interesting several 
members of the governing body in the school. 
Amongst these the name of Charles Clayton has 
already been mentioned. Another was the future 
Sir George Paget, who was appointed Perse Regis- 
trar in 1836. He started a school admission 
register which is still to be seen in the Caius College 
Treasury, many of its pages being written in his 
beautifully clear handwriting. He was also in the 
habit of being present at the Midsummer examina- 
tions, and in many other ways showing an interest 
in the boys. It is with no surprise, therefore, that 
we read of a whole holiday being given on December 
12, 1851, "on account of Dr. Paget's Marriage 
yesterday." The connection of his family with the 
school did not end then. Some half a century later 
a grandson of Sir George Paget entered the Perse, 
and to-day his name can be seen inscribed on one of 
the Honours Shields and Fellowship Board adorning 
the School Hall. 

The Master has left behind an interesting record 
of the holidays given by him. General Fasts and 
Days of Humiliation during the Crimean War and 
Indian Mutiny are whole holidays. The capture of 
Sebastopol and the signing of the Peace in 1856 are 
events to be celebrated by a whole day off school. 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 125 

Equally interesting are the holidays given on De- 
cember 4, 1 857, " in order to give us an opportunity 
of hearing Dr. Livingstone," and on March 15, 
1858, " to enable the boys and masters to see the 
great eclipse of the sun." But the headmaster must 
have felt proudest of all on April 4, 1 854, when there 
was " a Whole Holiday By order of the Trustees, 
P. H. Mason, late a student of this school [and his 
own son] being elected a Fellow of St. John's 
College." The son's success was but one of many. 
Four other pupils of Mason obtained fellowships at 
different colleges. Their success was in a very 
large measure due to the headmaster's inspiration. 

" Every boy felt and knew," says one of his pupils, " that 
as soon as he developed the slightest spark of Mathematical 
taste he found in his head master a firm friend, a teacher, and 
more, a worker with him, absolutely untiring in his efforts 
to clear away difficulties and encourage him to make big 
his aims." 

One of Mason's pupils stands out pre-eminently 
above ail his schoolfellows, not only as a great 
scholar, but as a great patriot. Edward Henry 
Palmer, an orphan, was admitted at Lady Day, 1 851, 
being then just ten years old. Few biographies are 
more interesting than that of Palmer, written by his 
friend, Walter Besant, but a few fresh facts con- 
cerning Palmer's school days have come to light 
since Besant wrote his book, and they will be of 



126 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

interest to all Perseans who are proud of their 
departed worthies. Palmer was three years at the 
Perse, and then left on account of ill health. But 
in that brief period he revealed some of that talent 
which afterwards brought him into such prominence. 
He was little over fourteen when he left, and it was 
still, in Besant's words, ** the days of small begin- 
nings." Placed at first like any other new-comer in 
the bottom class, he quickly worked his way up to 
the top but one, where he arrived before he was 
thirteen. At the end of his first year his name 
appeared in the prize list as the winner of a divinity 
prize open to the whole school. Had his constitu- 
tion been more robust at this period in his life, he 
would probably have won a scholarship at the 
University, and thus have been spared those years 
of struggle which preceded his admission to St. 
John's. He left when he was too young to have 
attracted the attention of his masters. 

" He was not," says Besant, " a bookworm, nor was he 
precocious. . . . He always disliked mathematics. . . . Those 
who remember him at that time, and were his schoolfellows, 
say that he was always small, and apparently weak of frame, 
yet that he could do things which proved great muscular 
strength and endurance ; thus he was admirable on the 
trapeze and gymnastic bars, and he was a bold and fearless 
swimmer. He took no part in the cricket field or at football, 
but he was clever with his fingers and he was constantly 
making or devising things ; he read a great deal, especially 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 127 

poetry ; and he was greatly caressed and petted by every- 
body, partly on account of a general belief that he would die 
early, partly on account of the singular personal charm which 
was always his most striking characteristic. 

" He began to feel his way in languages while still a boy at 
school, independently of his Latin and Greek. He learned 
Romany. This is not a language with a grammar, save at 
those heights of pure Romany to which few of the People 
attain. It is a vocabulary. The boy learned it by paying 
travelling tinkers sixpence for a lesson, by haunting the 
tents, talking to the men, and crossing the women's palms 
with his pocket money in exchange for a few more words 
to add to his vocabulary. In this way he gradually made for 
himself a gipsy dictionary. No one of all those who have 
been attracted by these picturesque wanderers knew them 
better, or could more readily enter into their minds than 
Palmer — not even his brother in Romany lore, Charles 
Leland. This acquisition of Romany is the only achievement 
of his school days in which one can find promise of the later 
days. There are not, it may be owned, many schoolboys 
who save up their pocket-money in order to take lessons 
of tramps and vagabonds in the gipsy tongue." 

The rest of his life — his distinguished University 
career, his great ride through the desert to his death 
amongst the Arabs, and his honoured grave in St. 
Paul's — belongs to the whole English nation, and 
the story has been told by Besant in a biography in 
words which every Persean of spirit will be the 
better for reading. 

Besant is probably right in suggesting that the 
Perse did not give Palmer everything which a 



128 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

school ought to give. It is to be feared that the 
Perse in his days was altogether lacking in any sort 
or form of school life or patriotism outside the school 
walls. As a contemporary says : 

" There was no organization of games, no school eleven, 
no school anything. Once outside the door of that big 
school the units fell to pieces for want of social cement, 
each going his own way to his house or to companions of 
his own choosing, doing exactly what was right in his 
own eyes. A shy self-conscious boy gained nothing but 
intellectual advantages — only part of what a school can 
give." 

To this lack of a proper esprit de corps must in a 
large measure be attributed the woeful decline in the 
discipline of the school in the sixties. So long as 
Mason was young and active, and so long as he could 
depend on the loyal assistance of his colleagues, 
discipline was good. But the day came when the 
Master grew past his work, and as often as not 
illness prevented him from coming to the school. 
Unfortunately, one of his assistants, a fiery Irishman, 
proved not only incapable of maintaining order but 
also openly disloyal to his chief. This Irishman 
succeeded Mr. Barber as Usher in 1861, and was 
soon afterwards left virtually in charge of the 
school. Under him the lack of discipline became 
so appalling that several prominent inhabitants of 
Cambridge made a public protest to the Trustees. 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 129 

The reply did not prove conciliatory, and the 
memorialists then enlisted the sympathy of the Town 
Council, which appointed a committee to enquire 
into the alleged defects of the school and to consider 
the most satisfactory means of placing the Perse 
more under popular control. Unfortunately this 
committee made very little progress. Its efforts 
were hampered by the extremely injudicious conduct 
of some of its supporters. The Usher saw fit to 
make a scurrilous attack on the chairman of the 
committee in the local press, the pseudonym under 
which he wrote being no less arrogant a title than 
" Rex Persarum 1 " Some of the chairman's more 
ill-advised friends retaliated by attacking the Usher 
in a similar strain. Then followed a long anony- 
mous correspondence, full of virulent abuse and 
mutual recrimination, which did neither side any 
good and the Perse a vast deal of harm. Both 
inside and outside the school things soon became 
intolerable. The climax was reached one memor- 
able day when the Usher and another Master fell 
out over some trivial dispute, and 

" came not only to bitter words, but to actual hldws in the 
middle of the school-room, aided and abetted by the shouts 
and jeers of all the boys. All this sounds incredible and, of 
course, is quite impossible nowadays : but it actually 
happened some fifty years ago." ^ 

1 Pelican, December, igog, p. 78. 



I30 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

After this the governors had to intervene, and both 
the combatants beat an ignominious retreat. The 
governors decided that it was time that a younger 
man had charge of the Perse, and so Peter Mason 
retired. For his past services he was awarded a well- 
merited pension. He did not live long to enjoy it, 
dying in 1868. He did good work for the school, 
when he was in his prime, and gratitude demands 
that this good work, and none of the evils which 
befell the Perse in his latter days, should live after 
him. It was his misfortune that his retirement was 
rendered necessary owing to circumstances over 
which ill-health prevented him from having any 
control. 

Towards the end of Mason's Mastership strong 
representations had been made to the Trustees about 
the neglect of classical teaching. In 1864 this 
defect was remedied. A Johnian, like his pre- 
decessor, Frederic Heppenstal was more of an all- 
round man. Not only was he a ninth Classic but 
also a senior Optime. During the eleven years he 
was at the Perse the school underwent a complete 
change. Discipline, which had been so deplorably 
lax in the late fifties and early sixties, went altogether 
to pieces during the interregnum which preceded 
his appointment. Even optimists prophesied that 
it would take many years to infuse a right spirit 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 131 

into the school, but such was Heppenstal's per- 
sonality that not only did disorder soon become a 
thing of the past, but there grew up a healthy 
patriotism which has been of lasting benefit to the 
school. Although his manner was somewhat 
austere, and constant ill health occasionally inclined 
him to be irritable, those of his pupils who got 
to know him well found he was endowed with 
genuine kindheartedness and unbounded liberality. 
A strict disciplinarian, he earned the respect and 
affection of all his pupils, and indeed of all people 
who can admire a good man endeavouring to do his 
duty in the face of an incurable disease. 

Heppenstal at once set to work to make school 
life more real outside as well as inside the classroom. 
He threw himself heart and soul into the boys* 
games and frequently took part in them himself. 
Athletics were by no means a novelty at the Perse. 
As early as 1856 cricket had obtained official 
recognition, for in September of that year the 
governors gave a whole holiday on the occasion of 
a match against Lynn School. Even before this 
the Perse had produced prominent local players ; 
A. J. D. Diver (adm. 1836) was the principal bowler 
for Cambridge Town in the days when the 
University had no easy task to beat that club, 
and C. J. Hutt (adm, 1B35) used to play for the 



132 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

University in the forties. But games, such as they 
were, formed no part of the school life until Hep- 
penstal's time. Until then the cricket and football 
teams were merely voluntary organisations got up 
amongst the boys themselves. Strictly speaking, 
Heppenstal did not introduce compulsory games, 
but he made games so popular an institution that it 
came to be a point of honour with the boys that 
membership of the school should entail membership 
of the Games Club. 

The reformer's hand was no less active inside 
the school than out. Classical teaching made such 
rapid progress that only two years after Heppen- 
stal's arrival the Endowed Schools Commissioners 
could report that the results were most encouraging. 
In time Heppenstal gathered round him a band of 
earnest students, whom he imbued with his love of 
classical learning and accuracy. Many of his boys 
afterwards figured high in the scholarship lists at 
Cambridge University. Five became fellows of 
their colleges, and of these one, T. J. Lawrence, 
obtained the unique distinction of being senior in 
two triposes. Law and Moral Science. At the 
same time mathematics were not neglected. This 
branch of the school was placed in the charge of 
Rev. John Wisken, himself an old Persean and a 
high wrangler. 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 133 

In providing for instruction in other subjects 
Heppenstal was severely hampered by the smallness 
of his staff. At one time a proposal was mooted 
that paying scholars should be charged special fees, 
and that these fees should go towards the main- 
tenance of a fourth Master, but the number of paying 
scholars was so small that nothing came of the plan. 
In 1866 there were only five non-foundationers, each 
paying ^^lo a year in addition to the payments 
directed by decree of 1841, ** and it has been found 
impossible hitherto to maintain an additional master 
for so small a number ; but the trustees have resolved 
that so soon as there should be six paying scholars 
another master should be engaged."^ In 1867 a 
French Master and Drawing Master were engaged. 
In the same year the two lowest classes were incor- 
porated in an English Department intended for those 
who were too young to receive or did not require 
instruction in Greek. In 1868 the advent of a sixth 
non-foundationer enabled the Trustees to appoint a 
fourth regular Master. During the next seven 
years further additions were made to the staff. 
Before he left, Heppenstal had seven assistants, 
including a Science Master appointed in 1873. 

These later additions to the staff were rendered 
possible as the result of a general re-arrangement of 

^ Report of Endowed Schools Commission, 1864-8. 



134 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

the Perse Trust under a scheme sanctioned by Her 
Majesty in Council on August 9th, 1873. In 
Cambridge there had prevailed for some time past 
a feeling that the school ought to be placed under 
the control of a body less independent of municipal 
influence.^ The committee appointed by the Town 
Council in 1861 was not altogether inactive, and had 
agitated for a new constitution for the Perse with a 
governing body on which the municipality should 
be adequately represented. The injudicious news- 
paper warfare, to which reference has already been 
made, for a time retarded progress in this direction. 
The Inspector of Endowed Schools, who visited the 
Perse in 1866, gave the movement very little 
encouragement. 

"There can be no doubt," he said, "that the existing 
body of trustees is well qualified to deal with all educational 
questions arising in connection with the school, and being on 
the spot, their advice and assistance is readily obtainable. 
The establishment of an English department too shows that 
they have no wish to make the course of instruction in any 
way exclusive or to restrict it to those for whom a high class 
or ' liberal ' education is desired. Probably the only dis- 
advantage attending the present institution consists in the 

* The first movement in favour of municipal control dates back 
to 1842. In that year it was proposed to converge a meeting to 
protest against the refusal of Caius College to award a Perse Scholar- 
ship to an old Persean, who had done well in his May examination. 
As, however, the conveners discovered that they were mistaken as 
to facts, the meeting was never held. 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 135 

check that may be given to the growth of that feeHng of 
common interest which should bind a town to its principal 
place of education." 

Nevertheless, the disadvantage which the Inspector 
thus airily passed over, was not wholly to be dis- 
regarded and was, in fact, appreciated by the 
Trustees themselves. 

The Endowed Schools Commissioners fully 
realised the necessity for giving the town a voice in 
the management of the school when in 1873 they 
approved of the new scheme drawn up under the 
Endowed Schools Act of 1869. Although 
numerous alterations have since been made as to 
details, the salient features of this scheme still exist. 
The greatest change was that made in the com- 
position of the governing body. The Master 
and four senior Fellows of Caius College were 
replaced by fifteen governors. The connection with 
Caius was, however, perpetuated by conferring on 
the College the right to nominate three of the 
members of the new governing body. Of the 
remaining governors, three were appointed by the 
University, six were appointed by the Town Council, 
and the remainder were co-opted. The co-opted 
members were appointed for six years and the others 
for three. 

The old titles of Master, Usher, and Assistant 



136 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

Usher were exchanged for those of Headmaster 
and Assistant Masters. The Headmaster was in 
future to be paid partly by a fixed salary and partly 
by capitation fees. The school was divided into 
two departments — a junior and a senior. The 
former was the same as the English Department 
estabHshed in 1866 and subsequently acquired the 
appellation of the Commercial Side, by which name 
it was known until Sides were abolished in 1902. 
The Junior Department was intended for boys 
between the ages of eight and sixteen, who were 
required to pay only half the fees payable in the 
other Department. For the Senior Department 
Greek was compulsory, and the boys were permitted 
to remain until they were nineteen. At the same 
time the number of free places was reduced to 
twenty-five, but these were still restricted to natives 
of Cambridge, Barnwell, Chesterton, and Trumping- 
ton. The Perse Scholarships and Fellowships at 
Caius had already come to an end, having been 
merged in the common scholarship fund of that 
college by the University Commissioners in i860. 
After that date boys from the Perse ceased to have 
any preference in election to scholarships at Caius, 
but no compensation was made to the school for 
this loss. 

The greatest change of all effected by the new 



FROM ONE REFORM TO ANOTHER 137 

scheme was the estabUshment of a school for girls. 
This was placed under the charge of ten managers, 
six being appointed by the governing body of the 
boys' school and four being co-opted. 

At the same time, steps were taken for the parti- 
tion of the trust property and the assignment of a 
portion thereof to the new governors for the sole 
use of the school. The Order in Council directed 
that land and securities should be handed over to 
the governors representing roughly two-sevenths of 
the whole trust income. The scheme for partition 
was not actually sanctioned until February 3rd, 
1880, when the governors received the Manor of 
Frating (subject to certain rights thereover reserved 
to the Perse Trustees), two farms comprising about 
four hundred and fifty acres, and woodlands com- 
prising about one hundred acres in the parish of 
Frating, and a sum of ;^6,22 8 2s. id. in Consols. 
Out of the rents and dividends accruing therefrom 
an annual sum of ;£i50, or in lieu thereof one 
quarter of the total income, was to be paid to the 
managers of the girls' school. The Frating 
property was held until 191 3, when it was sold to 
provide the purchase money for a site adjoining the 
boys* school. At the time of the partition it was 
valued at ^^20,000, but during the agricultural 
depression in the last century the property 



138 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

depreciated considerably. For a long time it was 
found impossible to pay the full contribution to the 
girls' school. 

Heppenstal remained at the Perse for two years 
after the introduction of the new scheme. In 1875 
he left to take up the Headmastership of Sedbergh 
School, where his work enhanced the reputation he 
had already won at the Perse. Unhappily a career 
full of promise was cut short by sudden death . 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 

The last fifty years cover approximately the Head- 
masterships of J. B. Allen (1875-84), H. C. Barnes- 
Laurence (i 884-1902), and W. H. D. Rouse 
(since 1902), For reasons, which are easily 
apparent, it is not possible to do adequate justice 
in the present chapter to all that has happened in 
the history of the Perse during that period. Never 
theless, so many important developments, deeply 
affecting the fortunes of the Perse, have occurred 
that a history of the school would be incomplete 
without some mention of them. 

One of the greatest changes of all during the 
period under review was undoubtedly the trans- 
plantation of the school from Free School Lane to 
Hills Road. For some years prior to 1888 Cam- 
bridge University had been buying up the site of 
what had once been the close of the Augustinian 
Friars. By the beginning of that year all the land 
except that occupied by the school and the Perse 

139 



I40 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

Almshouses had been acquired, and negotiations were 
begun for the purchase of the remaining strip of land. 
The school premises were too confined for the in- 
creased number of boys then attending the Perse, and 
the University's previous purchases had rendered 
expansion on the Free School Lane site impossible. 
Except on grounds of sentiment, no objection could 
be raised to the acquisition of the site by the 
University. Caius College offered for sale another 
site on Hills Road, which the governors purchased 
for /^45oo. The old premises were sold for 
;^ 1 2,000, and others erected on the new site from 
the designs of W. M. Fawcett, at a cost of ;£ 14, 500. 
In 1890 the new school was ready for the reception 
of masters and boys, and the migration took place. 
The buildings were formally opened at a public 
banquet at which the Rt. Hon. H. C. Raikes (then 
Postmaster-General) and the late Sir Richard Jebb 
were the principal speakers. Some of the interest- 
ing rooms of the old school were incorporated in 
the Engineering Laboratory which took its place, and 
the fine old Jacobean roof was preserved. Exter- 
nally, however, not a trace of the old school is now 
left. The Headmaster's house stood until 1912, 
but was pulled down in that year to make room for 
an extension of the Laboratory. 

To the new school buildings was added in 1892 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 141 

(with the assistance of a grant from the Cambridge 
Borough Council) a chemical laboratory. Other 
additions (including an armoury for the Officers' 
Training Corps) have been made in more recent 
years. The site was enlarged in 19 14 by the 
acquisition of the house adjoining it on the south 
side. 

A playing field off Luard Road was acquired in 
1906 from Trinity College. Until that date the 
Games Club had never owned a field, but had had 
to be content with the very unsatisfactory expedient 
of sharing Parker's Piece with other clubs. A 
miniature rifle range was constructed on the playing 
field entirely by members of the school. When the 
Perse was removed to Hills Road, neither Head- 
master nor Second Master was provided with a 
house on the new site. For a long time the masters 
had to find what quarters they could in the town. 
These premises were generally ill-adapted for the 
reception of boarders. Want of funds unfor- 
tunately prevented the governors from erecting 
boarding houses, and the matter of accommodation 
was left in a more or less unsatisfactory state until 
191 1. In that year the present Headmaster and 
Mr. I. H. Hersch each built a suitable house on land 
near to the playing field. The Perse owes a debt 
of gratitude to both of them, for these buildings 



142 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

were erected at their own expense. The arrival 
of boarders recalls the former days of the school's 
prosperity in the seventeenth century. In Septem- 
ber 1 910 the Preparatory Department was removed 
from the school buildings to Bateman House, thus 
releasing two class-rooms urgently needed for the 
increasing numbers. 

Perhaps the most far-reaching change, which has 
occurred during the period under review, is that 
which took place in 1902. It will be remembered 
that in 1 866 an English Department was established, 
which subsequently came to be known as the Com- 
mercial Side. From that date until 1 900 the Perse 
was conducted as a dual school with Classical and 
Commercial Sides. In 1899 there were approxi- 
mately 210 boys in the school. Of these, some 
thirty were in the preparatory department, and the 
remainder roughly divided as to two-thirds in the 
Commercial and as to one-third on the Classical Side. 
Boys on the latter side paid a higher fee, and the two 
sides were kept separate and distinct not only as 
regards educational work but also to a very consider- 
able degree as regards recreation and general school 
life. Such an organisation required an unusually 
large staff, and suffered from many obvious dis- 
advantages. In the autumn of 1 900 the Cambridge- 
shire Education Committee established in 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 143 

Cambridge a County School for Boys, where courses 
in technical and commercial subjects could be 
obtained at a very cheap cost. The Perse was at 
this time in serious financial straits, and it became 
apparent that with a competitor in the field the dual 
organisation must be abandoned. It was therefore 
decided that the school should be developed as a 
single school on the lines of the Classical Side, and 
that provision for the teaching required on the 
Commercial Side should be left in other hands. 

Of the actual work of the school in the earlier 
part of the period covered by this chapter, little need 
be said. When Mr. Barnes-Laurence was appointed 
Headmaster in 1884 there were less than 100 boys : 
in a few years he not only doubled the numbers, but 
immensely improved the efficiency of the school in 
all directions, and raised its tone and the standard 
of discipline. The record of scholarships and other 
successes at the Universities bear testimony to the 
good teaching of the school, while his influence on 
character, and encouragement of athletics and other 
sides of school life were no less marked. A keen 
cricketer himself, he set an example of interest in 
games, and introduced sound methods of adminis- 
tration and the " conduct of business " which have 
been of service to his pupils in after-life. The 
period of his Headmastership saw the establishment 



144 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

or revival of the Annual Athletic Sports (in 1887), 
of the School Debating Society, and of the school 
magazine, The Pelican. 

By a sad coincidence, he passed away within a 
few weeks of these lines being penned. 

The important change in the constitution of the 
school to which allusion has been made virtually 
coincided with the appointment as his successor in 
1 902 of Dr. W. H. D. Rouse, late Fellow of Christ's 
College. Perhaps no other Headmaster in the long 
history of English public school education has been 
surrounded by so able, so generous, and so devoted 
a body of workers and colleagues as Dr. Rouse. 
All in their persons and respective departments have 
contributed to a scheme of reform which is both 
comprehensive and unique. The time has not yet 
come to make public so intimate a record of unselfish 
labour and self-sacrifice. Suffice it to say that in 
time to come their names will be familiar to all who 
care to study one of the most remarkable and most 
successful experiments ever made in the history of 
English education. The curriculum of the Perse 
can now justly claim to be an "all subjects" cur- 
riculum. It has been built up by the united efforts 
of Dr. Rouse and his staff, working on broad 
principles which govern not only its plan as a whole 
but also the methods applied to its special or 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 145 

component parts. The object of the instructors is to 
unite throughout in a greater or lesser degree both 
mental and bodily activities. Premature specialisa- 
tion is avoided, and the pupil's mind is not overloaded 
with more new work than it can undertake at any 
one moment. By gradual process the master takes 
his pupil from what is known and what is concrete 
or easy to what is difficult, abstract, and unknown, 
and in the process the boy retains his vivacity and 
his interest in the acquiring of knowledge. 

It was on account of his teaching of Languages, 
and especially the Classics, that Dr. Rouse first 
attracted the attention of educationalists to the 
Perse School. He has applied not only to French 
and German, but also to Greek and Latin the 
natural or direct method, wherein experience is 
associated with expression and the idea with the 
spoken word. Chiefly owing to the success which 
has attended the experiments at the Perse this 
method has in recent years been adopted for the 
teaching of Modern Languages in other pro- 
gressive schools. Dr. Rouse has shown that 
the same method meets with conspicuous success 
when applied to Classical teaching. After all, 
as he says, ** the Romans used Latin and the Greeks 
used Greek to express their daily thoughts to one 
another," and there is no reason why life should 



146 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

not be breathed into what too often in the past 
has been the dry bones of Classics. 

The direct method has produced remarkable 
results in the teaching of French, in great measure 
due to the skill and devotion of Mr. L. C. de Glehn. 
Perhaps the most noticeable thing is the excellence 
of the pupils' French pronunciation. It is often 
hard to believe that some of the boys who have 
learnt French at the Perse have not acquired their 
accents in France. There have been some very 
successful productions of French plays, including 
de Banville's Gringoire^ performed in 1919. 

Experience has shown that the average boy can 
with little difficulty take four languages during the 
course of his school career and learn them thoroughly. 
At the Perse a boy's early years are devoted to a 
thorough grounding in English. At the age of 
ten he will begin to learn French by the direct 
method. Other languages are taken up at intervals 
of approximately two years. At the age of twelve 
a boy will have learnt to express himself easily in 
French, and will begin to study Latin. Two years 
later Latin will be followed by Greek, and at sixteen 
he will tackle German. When the fourth language 
is begun, French is dropped except for occasional 
reading to keep it fresh. In the teaching of each 
of these languages special attention is paid to 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 147 

pronunciation, and the speaking of the language 
precedes the writing of it. When the boy has by 
speaking learnt also to express himself in writing he 
turns to composition. He is not surfeited with the 
endless string of meaningless sentences for trans- 
lation and set pieces of prose which have driven the 
love of languages out of so many schoolboys in the 
past. In Latin composition, for instance, he will 
in the first instance be told a story in Latin and then 
be required to paraphrase it from memory. At a 
further stage he will be given the resume of a 
story and be expected to enlarge thereon. Later 
still he will be given a theme. 

Equal care is bestowed throughout the boy's 
school career on the teaching of English. In this 
subject the Perse has been fortunate in having the 
services of Mr. Caldwell Cook, the author of the 
" Play Way." He has proved what a vast deal can 
be done to instil into boys a genuine love for all that 
is highest and best in English literature. Boys are 
encouraged to write ballads and plays. They also 
give lectures to their forms on a variety of subjects. 
After the lecture has been delivered, the criticism of 
the form is invited and freely given. All these 
proceedings are taken by the boys as a matter of 
course, and by this system the boy-lecturer is saved 
from the tendency to priggishness which might be 



148 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

expected. He retains his natural boyishness, and 
with the co-operation not only of his Master but 
also of his schoolfellows learns to put pleasurable 
pursuits to real and valuable use. With a longing 
to create he acquires the abihty to justify his ambition. 

Great scope for giving practical expression to this 
creative enthusiasm is found in the dramatic per- 
formances which are staged by the boys each term. 
It is the Headmaster's ambition that handicraft, 
embroidery and kindred crafts should be Hnked up 
with literature and other intellectual studies. Thus, 
when it has been decided to act a certain play, the 
actors would make the furniture for the stage in their 
carpenter's shop, would design, cut out, and make 
their own costumes and embroider them themselves. 
It is a great idea, and has already in part been carried 
out. 

Outside the class-room the inauguration of 
numerous societies and institutions has done much 
to stimulate school life and school patriotism. Boys 
are thus brought together after lessons, and the 
corporate feeling is fostered. Among these institu- 
tions the Perse Players is one of the most important. 
Their productions have included plays of Shake- 
speare and classical drama. The Players have also 
staged pieces written by members of the society, 
some of which have been reviewed not unfavourably 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 149 

in the London press, and have appeared in print in 
the Perse Playbooks. A perusal of the printed 
plays shows the reader how true and deep a love of 
all that is best in the English language has been 
instilled into the boys at the Perse School. In the 
plays and poems which are to be found in the play- 
books there is none of the juvenile precocity which 
repels the reader as being forced and unnatural, but 
all the boyish naturalness which has so often in the 
past been stifled by the process of forcing. 

The numbers at the Perse School have increased 
remarkably during Dr. Rouse's Headmastership : 
in 1902 there were 139 boys (the numbers having 
fallen considerably owing to the establishment in 
1900 of the County School for Boys, referred to 
above, pp. 142, 143) ; there are now over 360. 

The Perse Union Society is a debating society 
which can with justification claim to stand in a 
marked position amongst school debating societies. 
Visitors' debates are held at frequent intervals, 
and maintain a high level. The principal officers 
of the Cambridge University Union Society have 
regularly accepted invitations to the School Society's 
meetings, when speakers from amongst the boys 
have taken leading parts in the debates. 

Mention must be made of the School magazine, 
which has taken its title of The Pelican from the 



150 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

School crest. It is by no means the earUest school 
magazine. In Mr. Heppenstal's time there came 
out every year a magazine called the Perse School 
Christmas Annual — subsequently abbreviated to the 
Ferse School Annual. It never seems to have 
obtained official recognition. Fiction filled most of 
the pages, and the chronicling of school events was 
not considered to be one of its necessary functions. 
The earliest number now known to be extant is that 
of 1 874, edited by H. T. O. and A. G. O. Pain under 
the pseudonym of "The Siamese Twins." ^ In the 
next year's Annual are some verses by the Editor's 
brother, Barry Pain — the first composition, it is 
believed, of that writer to appear in print. No 
terminal magazine was published until the Pelican 
came into being in 1889. This magazine is now 
well past its majority and leads a flourishing 
existence. 

Sport has not been neglected. The games 
were re-organised in 1905 and the school divided 
into houses. Association football gave way to 
Rugby in 1907, and the Perse is now able to put a 
powerful fifteen in the field. Hockey was intro- 
duced at the same time. As evidence that this 
branch of school life has received attention, it may 
be mentioned that in inter-university contests old 

^ See illustration, facing p. 66. 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 151 

Perseans have figured in the cricket, athletic, 
association football and hockey teams of the rival 
universities. 

Another branch of school activity, a cadet corps, 
was established soon after the close of the Second 
Boer War, and obtained official recognition in 
1905. Under Lord Haldane's scheme it was 
converted into an Officers' Training Corps, and, 
as such, prior to the recent war gained a higher 
percentage of certificates of efficiency than any 
other school in the country. The valuable work 
done in this branch of school life soon came to be 
realised. During the European War several hun- 
dreds of its past members gained commissions and 
served with distinction. 

Undoubtedly the most important and most 
valuable of all the school institutions which have 
sprung up during the last twenty-five years has 
been the Old Persean Society. It was founded at a 
meeting which was held in the school in December, 
1 90 1. Ever since that date its members have 
followed the fortunes of the school with close 
interest, and, whenever it lay in their power, have 
given evidence of their loyalty by practical support. 
In 1906 the Society came boldly into the field to 
champion the cause of the Perse. The financial 
condition of the school was at the time very critical 



152 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

indeed. The Society convened a public meeting on 
July 1 1 th of that year for the purpose of enlisting out- 
side support. Amongst the speakers who urged the 
claims and needs of the school upon pubHc attention 
were Lord Lytton, Sir George Fordham, Sir 
Walter Durnford, and the late Professor S. H. 
Butcher. A subscription list was opened im- 
mediately, and amongst the subscribers were Mr. 
Arthur Balfour and the late Duke of Devonshire. 
The sum of money then raised not only provided a 
reserve at a grave financial crisis, but also helped 
towards the purchase of the school playing ground. 
At a later date financial assistance was also offered 
towards the building of the boarding houses. In 
1 9 14 the Society undertook the raising of a Ter- 
centenary Fund for the furthering of the many 
necessary projects which must be set on foot if the 
school is to prosper in the future. Just before 
this a movement with similar objects had been 
started by friends of the school, and the two 
schemes were combined, but owing to the war 
action was suspended for some time. By 1919 a 
considerable sum had been raised, under the title 
of the Tercentenary and War Memorial Fund, 
which in that year provided the means for 
buying Gonville House, standing next the school 
on the North. The purchase, towards which 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 153 

Caius College contributed ^i^Oy has added greatly 
to the size and to the value of the present school 
site. 

Negotiations are now in progress for the acquisi- 
tion of additional land, greatly needed for games, 
adjoining the present playing-field. It is hoped 
that the Fund will in time be sufficiently augmented 
not only to provide for this, but also to enable a 
new school to be erected on this site capable of 
meeting the growing needs of the school, and in 
every way worthy of the place which it holds in 
education, for which the present buildings are quite 
inadequate. The Governors have decided on this 
policy, but are unable to carry it out until financial 
conditions permit. 

In November 1919 the Old Persean Society held 
a Tercentenary Dinner in the School Hall. The 
number of distinguished guests made the occasion 
memorable. Their Royal Highnesses, the Prince 
Albert and Prince Henry, then in residence at the 
University, were present, the former replying to the 
toast of " The Royal Family." The Marquis of 
Crewe proposed the toast of " The School," and 
the Bishop of Woolwich, an Old Persean, was in 
the chair. 

Mr. H. P. Cooke, who has been a secretary of 
the Society since its foundation, has spared neither 



154 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

time nor energy in directing its various activities, 
and particularly in organising the Tercentenary 
Fund. During the same period the post of 
treasurer has been conscientiously filled by Mr. 
Roger Smart ; Mr. P. J. Spalding for several years 
did invaluable work as secretary, while, as chairman 
of the Executive Committee and of the Tercentenary 
and War Memorial Committee, Mr. E. Saville Peck 
has rendered devoted service. 

Benefactions and financial assistance have also 
been forthcoming in the past from other sources. 
Trinity College has of recent years given the school 
generous support. In 1884, when certain alms- 
houses attached to the College were closed, the 
endowments were diverted to the foundation of 
scholarships at the Perse. In 1 909 the same College 
also established three leaving exhibitions tenable at 
the University. The Cambridge Town and County 
Councils both make generous grants in aid of the 
school. The County Council is now granting 
£1100 annually; the Town Council, though the 
Borough contributes its proportional share of this 
;^i2oo, gives ;/^400 in addition. The Board of 
Education has bestowed on the Perse (which shares 
that distinction with four other secondary schools) 
a special annual grant " so that the experimental 
work there being done in the teaching of Classics 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 155 

can be carried out more thoroughly." Acknowledg- 
ment must also be made of the valuable help given 
in many forms by Lady Frazer, whose advice and 
assistance have always been at the disposal of the 
Modern Language department. 

Mention may be made of the last four Chairmen 
of the Governors. Mr. J. Hamblin Smith, of 
Gonville and Caius College, was chairman from 
1897 to 1 90 1. He had a very intimate knowledge 
of the history of the school and was known not only 
to the Governors, but, by his frequent and welcome 
visits, to the masters and boys. The Rev. J. B. 
Lock, Bursar of Caius College, was chairman from 
1 90 1 to 1904, a period covering the critical days 
already mentioned when it was decided to abolish 
the Commercial Side. Mr. A. L Tillyard of St. 
John's College showed an active devotion to the 
school's interests during his long term of the chair- 
manship (i 904-1 920). Particular attention may be 
called to the way in which he brought the financial 
needs of the school to the notice of the various 
public bodies that now help it, and of his activities 
in negotiating the purchase of the playing-field. 
The school may have every confidence that it will 
be well served by Mr. G. Brimley Bowes of Em- 
manuel College, who, as an old boy, an active 
member of the Old Persean Society, and for the 



156 HISTORY OF PERSE SCHOOL 

last few years a devoted member of the Board of 
Governors, is admirably suited to holding the chair- 
manship to which he has recently been elected. 

A school's prosperity and usefulness is often 
judged by the numbers and successes of its pupils, 
and the Perse could well afford to be judged by 
these standards. But Perseans would fain have 
their school judged not by its scholarship successes 
and honours list, but by the measure in which it has 
contributed to the good of the State. The European 
War has given the opportunity of putting the school 
to this test. Not only were refugees from Belgium 
and Serbia received in the school during their exile 
from their own country, but in the field Perseans 
of all generations played an honourable part. 
During the war, as far as can be ascertained from 
available records, over 530 ** old boys " were on 
military service, and the decorations won include 
seven D.S.O.'s, one D.S.C., four M.C.'s and Bar, 
twenty-nine M.C.'s, seventeen of the various grades 
of the Order of the British Empire, and a number 
of other British and Foreign decorations. Of the 
number who served eighty-six did not return, and 
in their honour a Memorial Tablet^ is placed in the 
School Hall: it was unveiled on 21st May, 1921, 
by General Lord Home, G.O.C. in Chief, Eastern 

^ Provided from the Fund described above, p. 152. 



THE LAST FIFTY YEARS 157 

Command. The design was a labour of love on 
the part of an Old Persean, Mr. Cyrus Johnson. 
The Roll of the Fallen is too grievously long for 
mention to be here made of every Persean who 
has made the great sacrifice, but it is a proud 
record of the spirit which has pervaded the school 
through many generations. The greatness to which 
the Perse has attained has been purchased by those 
who were " not wanting to the city with their virtue, 
but made unto it an honourable contribution." 
The memory of this sacrifice will inspire in those 
who remain and those who follow after a sure hope 
that their school will rise to even further greatness 
in the years to come. 



INDEX 



Accounts, 26, 35, III. 
Admission of Free Scholars, 28. 
Admission Register, 34, 35. 
Airy, Sir G. B., 121. 
Albert, Prince, 153. 
Allen, J. B., 139. 
Amsterdam, 53. 
"An Inhabitant of Cambridge," 

85- 
Annual Athletic Sports, 144. 
Athletics, 131. 
Augustinian Friars, 10, 15, 24, 

139- 

Bailey, Jos., 99, 109, 119. 
Balfour, A. J., 152. 
Barber, Rev. George, 104, 121. 
Barnes-Laurence, H. C, 139, 

143- 
Barrow, Isaac, physician, 8, 13. 
,, Isaac, Bishop of St. 
Asaph's, 8. 
Batchcroft, Thomas, 48, 67. 
Becke, Kath. (Perse), 24. 

,, Martin, father and son, 

37- 
,, Perse, 37. 
,, Valentine, 37. 
,, William, 5, 9, 37. 
Becke arms, 24. 
Beecher, Sir William, 36. 

,, William, 36. 
Belgian refugees, 156. 
(Belward), Richard Fisher, 82. 
Besant, Sir Walter, 125. 
Bickersteth, Henry (Lord Lang- 
dale), 107, 114. 
Board of Education, 154. 
Boarders, 142. 



158 



Bond, William, 82. 
Borton, John Drew, 91. 
Boult, John, 62, 63. 
Bowes, G. Brimley, 155. 
Brady, Dr. Robert, 29. 
Brett, Joseph, 74. 
Bridon, William, 2, 16, 23. 
Brinkley, John, 88. 
Brundish, John Jelliand, 82. 
Burgess, Peter, 35. 
Burkitt, William, 66. 
Burroughes, Thomas Cooke, 82. 
Bury Corporation, 17. 
Butcher, Prof. S. H., 152. 
Butler, Jacob, 76. 

,, Neville, 46, 51. 

,, William, 7. 

Cadet Corps, 151. 

Caius, Dr. John, 6. 

Caius College, Master and Fel- 
lows of, 41. 

Cambridge Borough Council, 
141. 

Cambridge Chronicle, 85. 

Cambridge Corporation Com- 
mittee, 2. 

Cambridge County Council, 154. 

Cambridge Town Council, 154. 

Cambridge Town Council Com- 
mittee, 134. 

Carey, Valentine, 14, 22, 27, 41. 

Castell, Tollemache, 45, 51. 

Chancery Suit, 119. 

Chapman, Dr. Benedict, 92, 104. 

Charity Schools, 73, 96. 

Chaworth, Lord, 36. 

,, John, second Vis- 

count, 52. 



INDEX 



159 



Chemical Laboratory, 141. 
Chishull, John, 56. 
Church, Bartholomew, 10. 
Classical Side, 142, 143. 
Clayton, Charles, 120, 124. 
Cobbold, John Spencer, 91. 
Coery, James, 81. 
Commercial Side, 136, 142, 143. 
Cook, Caldwell, 147. 
Cooke, H. P., 153. 
Cory, Robert Towerson, 82. 
County School for Boys, 143, 

149. 
Crabbe, Thomas, 43, 50, 54, 71. 
Crayford, Robert, 43, 47, 54, 58, 

67. 
Crewe, Marquis of, 153. 
Cricket, 131. 
Cromwell, Oliver, 45. 
Cropley, Thomas, 3, 16, 24. 

Davy, Charles, 7S. 

,, " Charles, yr., 87. 

,, Dr., M. of Caius College, 
103, 109. 
Debating Society, 144. 
Dell, William, M. of Caius Col- 
lege.^ 48, 55, 58, 63. 
Devonshire, Duke of, 
Diver, A. J., 131. 
Dixon, Robert, 52. 
Dramatic performances, 148. 
Drawing, 133. 
Durnford, Sir Walter, 152. 

Eade, Dr., 57. 

Eastern Counties Association, 

46. 
Ellis, Thomas, 53. 
Ellvin, Simon, g. 

,, Thomas, g, 27, 37. 
Ely, (Gooch) Bishop of, 76, 77. 
Endowed School Commissioners, 

.134. .135- 
Engineering Laboratory, 140. 
English department, 133, 136, 

142. 

Fawcett, W. M., 140. 
Felton, John, 58, 63. 
Ferrar, Nicholas, 8. 
Fisher (Behvard), Richard, 82. 



Fitzwilliam collection, 97, 113, 

121. 
Football, 132, 150. 
Forby, Robert, 87. 
Fordham, Sir George, 152. 
Frating manor, 23, 47, 137. 
Frazer, Lady, 154. 
Free School Lane, 24. 
French, 133. 

" Gamaliel Thorn " Letter, 109, 

113- 
Games, 132, 141, 150, 152. 
Gilbert, Rev. E. W., 122. 
Gill, James, 72. 
Gimingham, William, 92. 
Girls' School, 137. 
Glehn, L. C. de, 146. 
Gonville House, 152. 
Gooch, Sir Thomas, 76, 77. 
Goodall, Henry, 75, 77, 80. 
Goodrich, Robert, 78. 
Goose, Jeremy, 33. 
Gordon, Jemmy, 83. 
Greene, Christopher, 65. 
Griffith, George, 29, 54, 63, 68, 

70, 108, 116. 
Grigby, George, 92. 
Gwilt, Daniel, 92. 

Hall, Mr., bookseller, 102. 
Handicraft, 148. 
Hare, Sir Ralph, 65. 

,, Thomas, 65. 
Harison, Ralph, 43. 
Harrison's Cantabrigia Depicta, 

93- 
Henry, Prince, 153. 
Heppenstal, Fred., 130, 138, 150. 
Hersch, L H., 141. 
Hills Road Scliool, 139. 
Hobson's Charity, 69. 
Hockey, 150. 
Hodson, Anne, 3. 
" Horn " in St. Sepulchre's 

parish, 16, 23. 
Home, General Lord, 156. 
Hough, Bishop of Woolwich, 

153- 

Inyon, Thomas, 72, 74. 
Ivory, Edmund, 64. 



i6o 



INDEX 



Jebb, Sir R. C, 140. 
Jenyns, George Leonard, 88. 
Johnson, Cyrus, 156. 

King's College Choristers 

School, I, 27, 38, 73. 
King's Ditch, 24. 

" Lancelot Probe " Letter, 109. 
Langdale, Lord, 107, 114. 
Langsdale, Edward, 39. 
,, Phoebe, 39. 

Laud, Archbishop, 39. 
Laurence, Richard, 53, 
Lawrence, T. J., 132. 
Legge, Dr., 6. 
Leland, Charles, 127. 
Livingstone, David, 125. 
Lock, Rev. J. B., 155. 
Loggan, David, 65. 
Louis XIV., 66. 
Love, Dr., 44. 
Lovering, Thomas, 26, 32, 35, 

36, 38, 40, 43, 45. 
Lukin, James, 37. 

,, Alderman Robert, 37. 
Lukyn, James, 52. 
Luthburne Lane, 24. 
Lynn Corporation, 17. 
Lytton, Lord, 152. 

Manchester Commissioners, 46, 

48, 54- 
Martin, H. O., 106. 
Mason, Peter, 121, 130. 

,, P. H., 125. 
Maude, Daniel, 106. 
Mazey, Mr., 41. 
Metcalfe, William, 108. 
" Minerva's darlings," 41. 
Modern Languages teaching, 

145- 
Mordecai, D. V., 102. 
Munnings, Daniel, 75. 

Naylor, Richard, 52. 

New Cambridge Guide, i8og, 

93- 
Newton, John, 29, 30, 32. 

,, Alderman Samuel, 29, 
70. 
Norwich, 45. 



Norwich Corporation, 17. 
Norwich School, 5, 40, 72. 

O.T.C., 141, 151. 
Old Perseans Society, 151, 153. 
Order of the Royal Oak, 52. 
Owen, Thomas, 53. 

Paget, Sir G. E., 124. 
Pain, Barry, 150. 

„ H. T. O. and A. G. O., 

150. 
Palmer, E. H., 125. 
Paske, John, 15. 
Pate, Robert, 72. 
Peck, E. Saville, 154. 
Pelican, 144, 149. 
Pepys, John, 36, 45, 51. 
,, Roger, 36. 
,, Samuel, 36. 
,, Talbot, 36. 
Perse, John, 4, 9. 

,, Katherine Becke, 9 ; wife 

of Martin, 24. 
,, Martin, 9, 14, 22, 24, 37, 

40. 
,, Stephen, 4, 12, 21 ; will, 

21 ; monument, 5. 
,, Stephen, of Trinity Col- 

lege,_ 9. 
,, Valentine, 40. 
,, William, 40. 
Perse arms, 4, 24, 25. 
Parse's of Northwold, Norfolk, 

4- 

Perse Almshouses, 24. 

Perse fellowships at Caius Col- 
lege, 16. 

Perse Play Books, 149. 

Perse Players, 148. 

Perse Scholarships, 16. 

Perse School Annual, 150. 

Perse School Christmas Annual, 
150. 

Perse Union Society, 149. 

Peters, Thomas, 56. 
,, William, 62. 

Plague, 64. 

Playing field, 141, 152. 

Population of Cambridge in 
1587, I- 

Preparatory department, 142. 



INDEX 



i6i 



Prime, Benjamin, 15. 
Prist, Henry, barber, 11. 

Raikes, H. C, 140. 
Reeve, Samuel, 81. 
Reeves, William, 108. 
Registrar, 34. 
Reveley, Francis, loi. 
" Rex Persarum.," 129. 
Rifle range, 141. 
Rixe, William Henry, 62. 
Rouse, Dr. W. H. D., 139, 144. 
Rugby, 150. 
Rules, 27. 

Russell, Edward, 65. 
,, Sir Francis, 65. 

Saffron Walden Grammar 

School, 35. 
St. John, Oliver, chancellor, 59. 
Saltier, Nathaniel, 75. 
Science master, 133. 
Scott, Sir Walter, 99. 
Serbian refugees, 156. 
Simeon, Charles, 121. 
Smart, Christopher, 80. 

,, Roger, 153. 
Smith, J. Hamblin, 155. 

,, John, 121. 

,, St. John, 92. 
Smithson, William, 15. 
Spalding, P. J., 153. 
Sparkes, Edward, 62, 70. 
Sparkes, junr., 74. 
Spicer, Robert, 14, 22, 27, 61, 
Spratford, John, 57, 62. 
Squire, John Franklin, 81. 
Sterne, John, 45. 
Story, Samuel, 81. 
Stourbridge Fair, 104. 
Sturgeon, Robert, 80. 

Tabor, James, 65, 66. 
,, John, 66. 



Tabor, Sir Robert, 65. 
Taylor, Jeremy, 38, 52, 73, 122. 
Tenison, Archbishop, 41. 
Tercentenary Fund, 152. 

,, Dinner, 153. 

Thelwall, James, 53. 
Thomaton, Andrew, 53. 
Thorold, Edmund, 52. 
Thring, Jeremiah, 108. 
Tillyard, A. I., 155. 
Trinity College, 154. 
Trinity College Choristers 

School, I. 
TurnbuU, Mr., 103. 
Turner, Bernard, organ builder, 
76. 
,, Henry, 81. 

University Commissioners, i860, 

136. 
Usher, 26, 29, 33, 34, 41, 62, 92. 

"Vulcan's servile bondslaves," 
41. 

Walford, William, 82. 

War Memorial, 152, 154, 156. 

War Record, 156. 

Ward, Mr., 15. 

Watson, Richard, 41. 

Webb, Edward, 57. 

White, John, 92, 94. 

,, William, 82. 
Whynne, Matthew, 66. 
Wilkins, William, 92, 98. 
Willson, James, 78. 
Wilson, Sir Giffin, 116. 

,, John, 94. 

,, Thomas, 52. 
Wiskin, Rev. John, 132. 
Woodhouse, Dr., log, 116. 

Yaxley, John, 53. 



Glasgow: printed at the university press by Robert maclehose and go. ltd. 



